Underwater Discoveries – News Archive July – December 2006

“A research center for underwater archeology will be established in the Persian Gulf as the first attempt to recover the Partho-Sassanid shipwreck discovered last September at a depth of 70 meters near Siraf Port.

However, the ship now named Wanli never reached the Malacca as she sank half way sailing through the South China Sea. The ill-fated voyage of Wanli remained a mystery until almost four centuries later when the wreck and her cargo were discovered off the coast of Terengganu.

Based on initial agreements between Iran’s Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization (ICHTO) and South Pars Oil Company, a center for underwater archeology will be established in the Persian Gulf as the first attempt to recover the Partho-Sassanid shipwreck discovered last September at a depth of 70 meters near the port of Siraf.

‘According to articles 9, 10 and 11 of the memorandum of understanding signed between ICHTO and South Pars Oil Company, the Company has accepted to take charge of the establishment of a research center for underwater archeological excavations in the Persian Gulf. Based on this agreement, recovering the discovered Partho-Sassanid shipwreck will be the first priority of this center’, said Hossein Tofighian, director of ICHTO’s Underwater Archeology Research Center to CHN.

“The great port of Alexandria was a bustling trade hub, a transit point for merchandise from throughout the ancient world, at least until much of it vanished into the Mediterranean Sea.

Treasure hunters have long scoured the Egyptian coast for vestiges of the port, thought to have disappeared about 13 centuries ago.

‘This is not your usual Ancient Egypt exhibit’, said archaeologist Franck Goddio, who led the expedition for the European Institute of Submarine Archaeology. ‘The artifacts have been living together under the sea for millennia, not gathering dust on a museum shelf.’.

“Conservation work on the Seahenge wooden circle is continuing apace – but it will be at least a year before the Bronze Age monument will be on display in Lynn.

The 4,000-year-old structure was uncovered by waves on the beach at Holme in 1998, sparking frenzied interest from the archaeological community.

Over the next two or three months they will be freeze-dried to remove any remaining water, before they are cleaned by experts and transported to Lynn Museum.

Robin Hanley, area museums manager for West Norfolk, said staff will spend the following six months painstakingly creating mounts and supports for the individual pieces.

“In the year 1625, a Portuguese vessel set off from China on a voyage to the Straits of Malacca. Onboard were tonnes of chinaware and pottery that would bring lucrative profits for the Portuguese.

However, the ship now named Wanli never reached the Malacca as she sank half way sailing through the South China Sea. The ill-fated voyage of Wanli remained a mystery until almost four centuries later when the wreck and her cargo were discovered off the coast of Terengganu.

A team of researchers led by Kuala Rompin-based marine archeologist Stan Sjostrand discovered the vessel in November 2003. It was later named The Wanli Shipwreck based on the manufacturing date on a few of the porcelain shards collected by the team.

During the team’s search and investigation in 2004, parts of the cargo comprising the priceless blue-and-white pottery and ocher wares were also recovered.

A trained naval architect, Sjostrand was also involved in the discovery of at least 10 shipwrecks and the excavation of their artifacts in Malaysian waters. Among them are the Tanjung Simpang wreck, Turiang wreck, the Royal Nanhai, the Nanyang and the Desaru wreck.

With limited resources available on the country’s maritime history, Sjostrand says findings from these shipwrecks could provide clues and a clearer picture of the maritime industry’s progress in the bygone era.

“A group of underwater archeologists from Greece is to come to Iran to help Iranian archeologists recover remains of a Partho-Sassanid shipwreck and its cargo, found recently in the Persian Gulf.

Iran’s Archeology Research Center has invited a team of underwater archeologists from Greece to come to Iran to help the Iranian archeologists in raising the newly discovered ancient shipwreck from the Persian Gulf.

The ship was accidentally discovered almost three months ago near the port of Siraf at a depth of 70 meters below the Persian Gulf. Initial studies by Iranian underwater archeologists on the ship and its massive cargo revealed that it was a merchant ship belonging to either the Parthian (248 BC – 224 AD) or Sassanid (224 – 651 AD) empires.

From the early days of this discovery, recovery of the Partho-Sassanid shipwreck of the Persian Gulf was seen far from being just a simple archeology expedition.

Considering the lack of experience as well as the insufficient equipments in underwater archeology in Iran, the Iranian archeologists concluded that the current state of technology in underwater archeology in Iran can not meet the demands of such massive project.

“The discovery of a nearly intact Roman shipwreck at the beginning of the last century provided a wealth of information about the trade among the Mediterranean cities of the time. But the most startling item to come out of the wreck wasn’t a work of art or a luxury item in the traditional sense.

In the centuries since it wound up on the sea floor, many of the metal parts had become compressed and encrusted to the point where it was difficult to tell where one part ended and the next began. The most complete reconstruction suggested that it might be an astronomical device, but there was little consensus on this proposal.

Now, a combination of X-ray tomography and analysis of the text and symbols has revealed many features of the device in stunning detail.

The new reconstruction proposes a mechanism involving 37 individual gears, with all but five of them having been recovered from the wreck. When functioning, a hand crank could send the device forward or backwards in time, with the faces revealing the relationship between dates, eclipses, lunar position, and other astronomical events relative to the ancient Greek calendar.

The device is sophisticated enough to include a mechanism that accurately recapitulates changes in the moon’s apparent motion due to its orbit being centered on the center of mass of the earth/moon system.

That last bit is especially intriguing, since these changes were first described by Hipparchus of Rhodes at roughly the time of the device’s origin, and the wreck itself contained other material from Rhodes. This raises the possibility that the device was potentially created with his direct input.

“A delicately elaborated nautical telescope, metal handheld lamps, intact pieces of dinnerware, and even a sailor’s shoe buckle are among the artifacts recovered from a sunken merchant ship in the bay of Valparaíso, discovered by a submarine sent out to monitor the progress of a project to make the bay deeper. The ship used Valparaíso as a port of call.

The remains were discovered by experts contracted by the Terminal Pacifico Sur firm (TPS), who are carrying out the bay expansion project to accommodate larger boats.

“Rocks with step-like cuttings, a wall and carved blocks have been found under the sea in the southern coast near the heritage site of Mahabalipuram. The Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) came across the remains while recently conducting excavations underwater at the site in Tamil Nadu.

‘Mahabalipuram is a historical place. We started detailed excavation 500 metres from the shore in the sea and recently came across different types of rocks, which indicate human activity’, said Alok Tripathy, Superintending Archaeologist of ASI’s Underwater Archaeology Wing.

‘We have also found a wall running from the shore into the sea’, he added.

The rocks, which were covered with a lot of vegetation were examined by experts and the cuttings on them were found to have many similarities with carved rocks on the shore, he said.

“Scientists in Indonesia are preparing to auction tens of thousands of artefacts salvaged from a sunken ship off the coast of Java.

They were only discovered when fishermen off the coast of Java brought up nets clogged with shards of ancient ceramics.

“Ten years ago a private research firm recovered a brass bell from a shipwreck site in Beaufort Inlet believed to be the Queen Anne’s Revenge.

The new bell is about 8 1/2 inches tall, roughly half the height of the one found in 1996, said Sarah Watkins-Kenney, QAR Project conservator.

“About 1,500 amphorae are part of the cargo scientists are sorting from a Roman ship that sank 2,000 years ago.

Archeologists have started exploring a sunken 1st century Roman vessel carrying about 1,500 clay amphorae, some still containing nearly 2,000-year-old fish bones nestled inside.

Boaters found its cargo of amphorae in 2000 when their anchor got tangled with one of the two-handled jars. Exploration of the site a mile off Alicante in southern Spain began in July, said Carles de Juan, a co-director of the project, who works for the Valencia regional government.

“The remains were discovered by accident in 2000 and after years of arranging financing and assembling crews, exploration of the site off Alicante in southeast Spain began in July.

The ship is estimated to have been 30 meters (100 feet) long with capacity for around 400 tonnes of cargo, making it much larger than other Roman shipwrecks found in the Mediterranean, de Juan said in an interview.

Marine archeologists in Spain said Monday that the shipwreck of a first-century vessel carrying delicacies to the richest palates of the Roman Empire had proved to be a dazzling find, with bones still nestling inside two-handled clay jars of fish sauce.

The ship is estimated to have been 100 feet long with capacity for around 400 tons of cargo, making it twice the size of most other Roman shipwrecks found in the Mediterranean, de Juan said in an interview with the Associated Press.

The freight was an estimated 1,500 well-preserved clay amphoras, or two-handled jars, used in this case to hold fish sauce — a prized condiment for wealthy Romans, he said.

For centuries the meter-tall amphoras lay undisturbed but for an occasional octopus that would pry one open, breaking the ceramic-and-mortar seal in search of food or shelter.

“Iranian archaeologists plan to raise an ancient ship recently discovered in the Persian Gulf, but they lack the equipment necessary to allow divers to work at a depth of 70 meters.

The ship was discovered about two months ago by Daryakav Company workers who were fishing in the Persian Gulf. Archaeologists believe it dates back to the Parthian or Sassanid eras based on the shards brought up in fishing nets and the large amphorae discovered on the ship. Amphorae were used during the Parthian and Sassanid eras.

‘Raising the ship is a major operation which requires skillful human resources and equipment’, Daryakav managing director Zolfaqar Arabzadeh told the Persian service of CHN on Thursday.

Diving with ordinary equipment would be lethal at a depth of over 40 meters.

“Little things turned out to be some of the biggest finds this fall from a shipwreck thought to be the Queen Anne’s Revenge.

And though archaeologists packed up their gear Wednesday and ended a five-week diving expedition at the site, they still have sand from some of the excavation units to sift through.

‘There may be some interesting things that show up in there’, said Richard Lawrence, head of the state Underwater Archaeology Unit. That’s how they found the small brass rooster finial, the apothecary weight and gold dust earlier in the expedition, said Chris Southerly, project archaeologist and field director.

After using a sluice to separate heavier objects, archaeologists then pan the sand, Southerly explained.

“Persian (Iranian) archeologists are determined to take the remains of the recently discovered Partho-Sassanid shipwreck and its cargo out of the waters of the Persian Gulf; however, there are many challenges and obstacles along the way. – View Movie

Lack of sufficient facilities has turned salvation of this Partho-Sassanid shipwreck a challenging task.

The Persian Gulf is a hot spot for oil companies whose ships continuously sweep over this body of water searching for new oil and gas resources.

Nevertheless, until last September no one was aware of the existence of an ancient ship sunken in the Persian Gulf near the port of Siraf until the local fishermen got hold of an unknown giant ship below the waters.

“An awe-inspiring array of Thailand’s antiquities has surfaced from the storage room of the National Museum of Vietnamese History to put a physical face on Buddhist culture.

Starting today, visitors will have chance to admire 200 objects for either domestic or ritual use, including abundant amounts of ceramic, bronze and wood materials dated from 19th and 20th centuries all the way back to the 4th century BC.

Statues of the Buddha in the collection are bronze enamel with gold decorative patterns that demonstrate skilful and clever hands of the ancient Thai artists as well as the historical development of typical Buddhist characteristics in Thai culture.

Apart from motif and ritual activities of Buddhism, the Thai national religion, appearance of Shimha lion, Garuda mythical bird or Kinari celestial female singers made of wood or oyster shells introduces the Thai architectural decorations influenced from the art style of Hinduism.

“Taking a company public is risky. Searching for buried treasure is chancier. Staking a claim on government artifacts may be plain lunacy.

Put them together, however, and you have the makings of a viable treasure-hunting business. Or so hopes a group of Bucks County entrepreneurs, who took their shipwreck salvage business public last year and now have an international fracas on their hands.

Sovereign Exploration Associates International Inc., of Newtown, believes it has pinpointed off the coast of Nova Scotia a trove of 19th-century artifacts and coins from the White House and U.S. Treasury that the British plundered during the War of 1812.

The company says the long-missing loot may have gone down on a British 18-gun brig, the HMS Fantome, which sank in 1814 off the coast of Halifax, then a key British port. Historians say the missing artifacts would have immeasurable historic value, but no documents have turned up proving or disproving the Fantome actually carried them.

“They are questions that have intrigued scientists, archaeologists and historians for centuries: When did Native Americans first arrive on the North American continent, and where did they settle?

Now, Robert Ballard, president of the Institute for Exploration at Mystic Aquarium, and Kevin McBride, research director of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum, and other researchers hope to answer that question.

On Wednesday, Ballard, McBride and Dwight Coleman, the IFE’s research director, outlined plans for a multiyear expedition to chart the location of ancient coastlines now underwater, identify sites of Native American settlements and find artifacts to prove they were there and date their arrival.

‘The most important questions about early American habitation can only be addressed underwater’, said McBride, adding that the underwater vehicles and exploration technology developed by Ballard are finally making such research possible.

“A Netanya beach lifeguard who stumbled on an iron anchor while out for a swim has led marine archeologists to uncover the first evidence of an ancient anchorage for sailing vessels in Netanya, the Israel Antiquities Authority announced Tuesday.

The anchors, which archeologists date to the late Middle Bronze Age, have a single perforation, are 0.9m high and 0.6m wide and weigh 150 kilograms each.

“Excavators of the sunken ship of the notorious pirate Blackbeard will have to wait to get the ship’s cannons because of a lack of equipment.

Divers with the Queen Anne’s Revenge Project say they may have to wait until spring because they do not have the right vessel to lift the cannon.

“Underwater archaeologists found something to crow about this week on the Queen Anne’s Revenge shipwreck site.

Divers discovered a 1-inch-high brass rooster, the decorative top to something — but they don’t know what.

‘On the base, you can tell where the metal broke off’, said Linda Carnes-McNaughton, a historical archaeologist with Fort Bragg who volunteered this week with the QAR Project.

“A massive underwater landslide in Lake Tahoe thousands of years ago caused a tsunami and left ripplelike stony ridges on the lake bottom, according to a new study.

Three scuba divers, a robot submarine and researchers from the University of Nevada in Reno and the U.S. Geological Survey spent two years surveying the bottom of Lake Tahoe to piece together the landslide’s story. Their findings are being published in the November issue of Geology magazine.

The waves created by the slide traveled 12 miles and must have splashed tremendously high when they reached the lake’s eastern shore, said survey leader James G. Moore of the Geological Survey.

“Cyprus’ reputation as an archeological gold mine has been given another boost, with an important underwater Bronze Age discovery.

A team of maritime archeologists from the UK has uncovered 120 stone anchors off the coast of Paphos. The anchors, some of which date back to the Bronze Age (2500-1125BC), are the second largest collection in the eastern Mediterranean.

The fact that so many anchors have been found at the same site suggests that the area may have once been an important port, serving the maritime traders on the busy trade routes to and from the east.

“Three divers accused of modern-day piracy after a shipwreck was allegedly looted are due to go on trial in Italy today.

Nicholas Pearson, a property developer from Yarmouth, David Dixon, a marine consultant from Aylsham, and Kerr Sinclair, a diver from Corton, near Lowestoft, are accused of illegally diving and damaging the wreck of the Pollux, an Italian steamship which sank off the island of Elba in 1841.

If found guilty of stealing items from the wreck and damaging the artistic and cultural patrimony of property belonging to Italy, the men face up to four years in jail.

After three weeks of diving, they had recovered 311 French and Spanish gold coins, 2,000 silver coins, some diamonds and a gold locket believed to contain a lock of Napoleon’s hair.

At the time of the initial police investigation in 2001, they told the EDP they had consent from both the British and Italian governments and had stumbled across the Pollux while looking for another wreck. All three had hoped the matter was at an end after spending months on police bail and paying a fine to British authorities.

“Three Britons are due to go on trial in Italy today accused of illegally salvaging more than £320,000 worth of gold, silver and diamonds from a shipwreck. Nicholas Pearson, David Dixon, and Kerr Sinclair are accused of illegally diving and damaging the wreck of the Pollux, an Italian steam ship which sank off the coast of Elba in 1841.

Pascal Kainac, a historian from Paris, will also stand trial today at Portoferraio in Elba for supplying the men with the ancient maps and co-ordinates to help them find the Pollux.

“Delaware’s underwater ‘big dig’ has resumed and numerous new artifacts from the state’s oldest-known shipwreck have surfaced.

The Roosevelt Inlet shipwreck, which archaeologists have been studying for nearly two years, is believed to be British commercial vessel the Severn, which sank in May 1774.

Archaeologists and beachcombers have recovered more than 45,000 artifacts from the vessel and more are being unearthed each day. Additionally, the state has applied to list the shipwreck on the National Register of Historic Places.

‘This is an exciting chapter in Delaware’s maritime history’, Secretary of State Harriet Smith Windsor said Wednesday during a briefing on the resumption of recovery efforts.

“Haig Jacobs emerges from the Pacific waters and punches a triumphant fist skyward. ‘It’s gold, fellows! It’s pure gold!’ he shouts to fellow treasure hunters aboard the salvage boat Nautilus.

Then he opens his palm, revealing a lump of mud hiding a spool of pure gold thread — more evidence the team has discovered the 400-year-old hiding place of a sunken, treasure-filled Spanish galleon.

Led by Joel Ruth of Brevard County, Los Caballeros Aventureros – The Gentlemen Adventurers, loosely translated – have wrested enough galleon remnants to bolster their dreams of making the find of a lifetime beneath the sands and volcanic mud off Ecuador’s north coast, 13 miles from the equator.

The Nuestra Senora de la Magdalena (Our Lady of Magdalene) sank about a mile off the Jama River in 1612, where the sea’s treacherous shoals swallowed the ship. In the hold was a king’s ransom of gold, silver and gems.

“Cyprus has marked in a novel way its participation in celebrations to commemorate ten years since the establishment of the International Court of the Law of the Sea.

The Republic’s Ambassador to Germany, Leonidas Markides, handed to the Court, based in Hambourg, a replica of the Kyrenia ship, as a sign of respect and appreciation for the work of the Court.

The ancient Kyrenia ship was discovered by a Cypriot diver in the mid ?60s off the island’s northern coastal town of Kyrenia, under Turkish occupation since 1974, and has been on display since its discovery.

It offered historians a valuable insight into the shipping and trade industry of its era, around 300 BC.

“Joint Russian and German bottom survey of World ocean’s southern part near the Drake Passage resulted in discovery of the previously unknown vast underwater plateau Pirie.

“A large number artefacts recovered from nine historical shipwrecks off the coasts of Malaysia, spanning more than 1,000 years, will be on display and put up for sale at Aquaria, Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre here next month.

The month-long event starting from Oct 1, will offer for sale items such as urns, bowls, bronze gongs, plates, Ming blue and white china with dragon and phoenix motifs, gourd bottles, Qing blue and white porcelain from the famous kilns in Jingdezhen, and teapots from Jiangsu, China.

The items come with historical backgrounds.

“Possibly the world’s most ancient gold coin has been discovered in a high mountain lake in Kyrgyzstan, the chief of an archeological expedition said Wednesday.

“Divers investigating a newly discovered sunken ship in a channel near Port Aransas said an exploratory dive provided some answers but also raised lots of questions.

The team of divers made a reconnaissance dive Monday to examine the ship, which a parasailer spotted this summer in about 20 feet of water near San Jose Island.

‘It’s a lot older than I thought it would be’, said Steve Hoyt, a marine archaeologist with the Texas Historical Commission.

“Ancient treasures from five ships sunken in Vietnam’s waters are now on display for the first time in Can Tho city, the Mekong Delta.

The exhibition, jointly organised by the Can Tho City Museum and the Vietnam History Museum with the theme “Treasures From Five Ancient Shipwrecks in Vietnam’s seas,” was opened on Aug. 22.

“Divers found an object underwater Wednesday that might be the wreckage of a 500-year-old Spanish ship, South Carolina officials say.

The ship was a lead vessel in an expedition headed by the first European explorer of South Carolina — and the first European possibly to have landed along the North Carolina coast.

Underwater archaeologists found an object, perhaps 100 feet long, buried under sand in water near South Island, off Georgetown County.

“Villager Bob Petrucelli is at home 15 feet under the ocean’s surface. So at home, he says, he’s surprised he hasn’t sprouted gills during a lifetime of diving for buried artifacts.

‘I’ve been diving since the ’60s’, Petrucelli said. ‘I love working underwater.’.

Lately, Petrucelli has been helping an archaeologist and his team in an excavation off the coast of the Dominican Republic, trying to find artifacts from a British ship that was sunk between 1652 and 1659. The team determined the artifacts originated in the 17th century ‘based on silver coins down there’, Petrucelli said.

“In ancient times, when Scotland was virtually covered in dense forest, there was only one way to get around. Traveling by boat helped early Scots to find food and trade goods with their neighbours.

Radio carbon tests conducted later dated the 30-foot-long log boat, which had been carved out of a single piece of oak, to around 1000BC. This means the Carpow boat is the second-oldest dated log boat ever found in Scotland, and it is also one of the best preserved.

“Three shipwrecks including one resembling a Portuguese warship have been discovered in the Straits of Malacca.

Dr Flecker is the managing director of Maritime Explorations and has been involved in underwater explorations for the past 20 years. He said the warship was located in an area between Pulau Upeh and Pulau Panjang off the coast of Malacca.

“One of the oldest boats discovered in Scotland is being excavated and raised from its site in the Tay Estuary. The Carpow log boat, as it is known, situated near Abernethy, was discovered in 2000.

Records show seven log boats found in the Tay estuary, but only one survives, in Dundee Museum. Found in 1860, it has been dated to about 500AD.

“Researchers and students from the University of Bristol are investigating a fireship that sank off the Isles of Scilly nearly 300 years ago in one of the worst maritime disasters in British Naval history.

Firebrand was launched at Limehouse in 1694, serving in the Caribbean and Mediterranean until her disastrous final voyage.

“As luck would have it, time ran short, and the silt and mud in La Isabela Bay on the north coast of the Dominican Republic ran deep.

‘The discovery of a Columbus shipwreck, let alone the finding of the flagship Mariagalante, would be a tremendous contribution to maritime archaeology’, said Charles Beeker, director of Academic Diving and Underwater Science Programs in IU Bloomington’s School of Health, Physical Education and Recreation.

‘Perhaps more important would be the cargo. Were the ships laden with native Taino Indian artifacts heading to Spain? Such a find would shed new light on the nature of the contact period between the Old and the New Worlds.’

Earlier this summer, Beeker and Geoffrey Conrad, director of IUB’s Mathers Museum of World Cultures, took a team of faculty and graduate students to the Dominican Republic to explore intriguing magnetometer anomalies the IU researchers had discovered 10 years ago.

“They may, or may not, have found the wreck of the Griffon. But even before the discovery has been confirmed in the waters of north-eastern Lake Michigan, a dispute has broken out over who would own what remains of the 17th-century French vessel that experts have described as a ‘Holy Grail’ of north American marine archaeology.

The Griffon vanished – almost certainly in a storm – shortly after it set off in autumn 1679 on the return leg of its maiden voyage from Niagara at the eastern end of Lake Erie, to Green Bay on Lake Michigan.

The first-ever decked European-built ship to sail the Great Lakes took to the bottom a cargo of furs and a crew that included a legendary giant sailor called Luc the Dane.

Fireships, such as Firebrand, were initially designed to be sailed against enemy fleets at anchor, loaded with incendiaries. More often than not, however, the vessels were used as patrol or convoy escort sloops.

More than 15,000 Royal Navy seamen lost their lives when the ill-fated fleet under the command of Sir Clowdisley Shovell, crashed into the Western Rocks off the Isles of Scilly.

“The first time the world saw clear images from the shipwrecked Titanic, they had a team of 10 engineers from Woods Hole to thank. But not much was heard about any of them at the time.

Most of the attention went to explorer Robert Ballard, who had discovered the sunken ship in 1985. Ballard, then director of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Cape Cod, returned from that trip with grainy, black and white images of the ship.

It wasn’t until 1986, when engineers invented a deep-water, remote-controlled robot, that the public could see high-resolution color footage of the historic wreck.

On Friday, the team of 10 engineers from Woods Hole was formally honored for its achievement with the second annual Great Moments in Engineering Award. The award was given out in Boston by GlobalSpec, an engineering search engine company.

“Vietnam province authorities recently discovered a shipwreck off the central coast loaded with antique pottery, reported central Binh Dinh province museum.

According to the museum authorities, the wreck is located at sea waters of My Duc commune of Phu My district in Binh Dinh province.

“In the 1800s, a shipwreck created a nation in the Caribbean Sea.

For the next two weeks, a pair of Gainesville marine archaeologists will search the water off the Turks and Caicos Islands looking for artifacts to positively identify the Trouvadore, a wooden-hulled slave ship that wrecked there in 1841. The African slaves that survived the wreck were freed to populate the islands.

It’s a high-profile project that’s rare in the specialized field of marine archaeology, and researchers say it could fill a gap in the historical record and give the inhabitants of the islands a material link to their past.

‘If it turns out that this is the Trouvadore, it would be huge for the nation itself’, said Jason Burns, one of the two archaeologists making the trip. ‘Pretty much anyone on the island can trace their lineage back to the wreck.’.

Michael Krivor, 38, and Burns, 34, both of Gainesville’s Southeastern Archaeological Research Inc., leave for the two-week expedition today.

The find is believed to be the first of its kind.

While the coastal city of Visakhapatnam is steeped in history, few know that there was a temple called ‘Visakeswara Temple’ on the coast of the city. Many centuries ago this temple went under the sea due to geological adjustments.

According to Professor Gangadharam, who is working on facts regarding this temple, the temple existed centuries ago, but got submerged in the sea.

‘From the research I did, I found out that the Buchca Rama Lingeshwara temple which right now exists on the coastline is in the same alignment with that of Visakeswara temple under the sea. I have spoken to many old people and fishermen who told me that their forefathers used to confirm that there is this temple under the sea.’

Paul Dunbavin

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Santha Faiia