A 3,300-year-old shipwreck discovered in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Israel contains hundreds of preserved urns, possibly carrying oil and wine.
The shipwreck—which the Israeli Antiquities Authority called the world’s oldest discovered—was found by London-based natural gas company Energean while investigating the sea bed with a robot for an environmental study. The ship’s remains were found around 56 miles (90 kilometers) from the coast of Israel, at a depth of 1.1 miles (1,800 meters) below sea level.
The ship dates to the 13th or 14th century B.C., according to the Israeli Antiquities Authority, and the Canaanite storage jars were probably carrying oil, wine, and agricultural products such as fruit.
The antiquities authority also said that the finding changes the understanding of how the ancients sailed.
“This is a sensational discovery: in the Middle East, only two other sets of ships from the Bronze Age are known [and they] were both discovered near the coast of Turkey,” said Yaakov Sharvit, director of the Maritime Archeology Unit at the Antiquities Authority. “However, in both of these cases, the ships were found near the coast, at depths that allow instruments to be dived. This led to the widespread assumption that the voyage at that time was made from port to port, in a way that allowed eye contact with the shore.”
This finding changes that assumption, according to Mr. Sharvit, showing that 3,300 years ago sailors used the celestial body as a guide, calculating the angle of the sun and the stars to navigate the sea when they lost sight of shore.
The maritime unit said the research potential is great because “time froze” there as the cargo was not disturbed by humans or the activity of waves and currents as happens in shallow waters.
The urns will be displayed in the National Archaeological Museum in Israel this summer.
“Given the importance of the discovery, we decided to display the Canaanite jars that were brought out from the depths of the sea and tell the unique story of the ship to the public, as part of the opening of the National Archaeological Museum,” said Eli Escozido, director of the antiquities authority.
