{"id":344615,"date":"2025-12-15T02:41:26","date_gmt":"2025-12-15T02:41:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/aerospace\/you-can-now-see-750-year-old-artifacts-recovered-from-englands-oldest-shipwreck\/"},"modified":"2025-12-15T02:41:26","modified_gmt":"2025-12-15T02:41:26","slug":"you-can-now-see-750-year-old-artifacts-recovered-from-englands-oldest-shipwreck","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=344615","title":{"rendered":"You Can Now See 750-Year-Old Artifacts Recovered From England’s Oldest Shipwreck"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Gravestone slabs, cauldrons and other items recovered from the \u201cMortar Wreck\u201d are now on display at the newly reopened Poole Museum in southern England<\/h2>\n
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Sarah Kuta<\/a><\/p>\n

– Daily Correspondent<\/span><\/p>\n

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The vessel was transporting intricately carved gravestones and grinding mortars when it sank.
\n Bournemouth University<\/span>
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In 2020, a local scuba diver and skipper stumbled upon the well-preserved remains of a rare\u00a013th-century shipwreck<\/a> off the coast of Dorset, England. The ship, which became known as the \u201cMortar Wreck<\/a>,\u201d was given the highest level of government protection in 2022, making it England\u2019s oldest known protected wreck site with a visible surviving hull.<\/p>\n

Now, the Mortar Wreck is the focus of a\u00a0new gallery<\/a> at the Poole Museum, located roughly 115 miles from London along the English Channel. In addition, the Mortar Wreck discoveries were also featured in a\u00a0new episode<\/a> of the popular \u201cTime Team\u201d series in late November.<\/p>\n

At the museum, visitors can get an up-close look at some of the objects researchers have recovered from the 750-year-old wreck, which was transporting limestone gravestones and grinding mortars when it sank. The Mortar Wreck items are being displayed alongside other remnants of the area\u2019s maritime past, including an\u00a0Iron Age logboat<\/a> discovered in Poole Harbour in 1964 and objects recovered from other medieval wrecks in Studland Bay and the Swash Channel Wrecks. The museum\u00a0reopened<\/a> last month after a multi-million-dollar renovation.<\/p>\n

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The items are on display at the newly reopened Poole Museum.<\/p>\n

Bournemouth University<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cYou can\u2019t help getting sucked in,\u201d says Joe Raine, collections officer at the Poole Museum, to\u00a0BBC News<\/a>\u2019 Patrick Hughes and Charlotte Andrews. \u201cHopefully [visitors] start to see a little of themselves in those people from 800 years ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sometime around 1250 C.E., the Mortar Wreck set off for an unknown destination with its precious cargo. The vessel is a \u201cclinker\u201d ship, crafted from overlapping planks of wood. Tree-ring analyses suggest the planks came from Irish oak trees that were cut down between 1242 and 1265 C.E., according to a statement<\/a> from Bournemouth University. Researchers aren\u2019t sure where the vessel was constructed, because Irish oak was a popular and widely exported material for building ships during the medieval period.<\/p>\n

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Quick fact: The history of \u201cclinker\u201d ships<\/h4>\n

The earliest known vessel of this kind was unearthed in Denmark<\/a> and dates to 300 C.E.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Researchers don\u2019t know why the ship sank. However, they suspect the heavy cargo might have had something to do with it, \u201cparticularly if the \u2026 stone was pitching around in a storm,\u201d Hefin Meara<\/a>, a marine archaeologist at\u00a0Historic England<\/a>, told the\u00a0Telegraph<\/em><\/a>\u2019s Craig Simpson in 2022.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems to have been setting out from Poole Harbour, and gone down about [a mile] out,\u201d Meara added. \u201cIt\u2019s close enough to swim to shore, but, in stormy weather, it could have been fatal.\u201d<\/p>\n

Whatever the cause of its demise, the vessel sank to the bottom of Poole Bay on the edge of the Swash Channel, where low-oxygenated water, sand and stones helped preserve it for centuries.<\/p>\n

Maritime archaeologists had long known there might be something submerged at the site. But they\u2019d never dived down to explore because they thought it was \u201crubbish,\u201d says\u00a0Tom Cousins<\/a>, a maritime archaeologist at Bournemouth University, to the BBC.<\/p>\n

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The smaller of the two grave slabs weighs around 154 pounds.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Bournemouth University<\/span><\/p>\n<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, Trevor Small had a hunch he might find more than just \u201crubbish\u201d on the seafloor. Small, a local charter boat skipper, got permission to dive the site in the summer of 2020 and discovered the headline-making wreck and its cargo.<\/p>\n

Maritime archaeologists, including Cousins, have been investigating ever since. They\u2019ve recovered numerous items, including a cauldron used for cooking food over a fire and\u00a0two gravestone slabs<\/a> in \u201cremarkably\u201d good condition, per Bournemouth University.<\/p>\n

One of the slabs, which weighs around 154 pounds and measures 5 feet long, is decorated with a wheel-headed cross\u2014a symbol that was popular during the early 13th century. The other, which weighs roughly 440 pounds and measures 6.5 feet long, bears the splayed arm cross design that was more common in the mid-13th century.<\/p>\n

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Bournemouth University uncovers earliest English medieval shipwreck<\/p>\n

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