Ancient Shipwrecks Found at the Bottom of the Black Sea

A large expedition of marine archaeology has found ships at the bottom of the Black Sea used in antiquity. According to the scientists, nobody has seen those ships before. The expedition is international and is funded by the millionaire Hans Rauing.

Dr. Dragomir Grbov from the Center for Underwater Archeology, Sozopol: I think we have just made one of the most important discoveries in the world underwater archeology. What we have is an antique ship that is almost entirely preserved, with all its construction, with many elements that are completely unknown to science so far.

Professor John Adams, head of the Black Sea scientific expedition, Southampton: We have seen many shipwrecks, but we rarely see such a thing with its entire ship structure. But here in the Black Sea the environment is such that much has been preserved from the structure of the ship and its cargo.

Dr. Krum Bachvarov - Marine Archeology, University of Connecticut: The mast is broken, but its lower part remained. There is a full load of amphorae, we saw at least 2 types of amphorae and we found ceramics, kitchen ceramics, we found part of the galley, ie. the kitchen of the ship.

Dr. Dragomir Garbov: Actually here we have a ship that shows that all the reconstructions made so far are not true. I think we'll rewrite the history of shipping this time.

The restorations of the upper parts of ships has beeb based on interpretations, and here for the first time we have a really preserved structure.

Dr. Krum Bachvarov: Nowhere have we ever seen a ship of this period in such an incredible state.

In a study of the bottom, the expedition has detected at least 60 shipwrecks. They are determined to go down to one of them and pick up one of the amphorae. The ship is on shallow, traces of trawls are everywhere. The amphora reveals 10th century.

One of the ship's reels stood for 11 centuries under water also carries important information. It is made of oak. The only other ship known to the scientists, was proved to have been ruled by Bulgarians.

“ Which makes us wonder if the oak construction of ships was characteristic of our lands. The specific thing, which it could mean is that the two oak ships were built in Byzantine tradition of shipbuilding, but it is possible that they were built on the Bulgarian lands.

And the registration and study of shipwrecks at the bottom are a side effect of the main scientific task. Namely, to gather enough data to answer the question - was there a flood in the Black Sea. To do so, dozens of drillings have been made at the bottom.

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