Uluburun Shipwreck Research Articles

Judging a ship by its anchor: Bronze age stone weight anchors as indicators of ship size

Three scale models of a one-hole stone anchor found at the Uluburun shipwreck site were tested in the sea, with their dragging force history being monitored and recorded. It was found that on a sandy seabed the measured holding power of an anchor is about 37 % of its dry weight, and about 49 % of its dry weight on a rocky seabed. The results were applied to the Ma‘agan Mikhael II replica ship, and the forces acting on the ship, in different sea conditions, were compared to the holding power of the anchor. Wind velocity of 31.1 knots (16 m/s) and a current velocity of 2.9 knots (1.5 m/s), were chosen as representing extreme sea conditions. The forces acting on an anchored Ma‘agan Mikhael II ship under these conditions were calculated and extrapolated for ships of different dimensions, but with the same structure and proportions as the Ma‘agan Mikhael II using the replica scaling relations. These were compared to the holding power of the anchor, and the results can create a model that estimates the maximum size of the ship (as represented by its cargo capacity) by the mass (weight) of the anchor. This model estimates the size of a ship using a single one-hole stone anchor.

Why Central Asia’s Mushiston is not a source for the Late Bronze Age tin ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck

Tin was a crucial commodity in prehistory to produce bronze, and knowledge of the origins of this metal is important for understanding cultural relations and the complexity and extent of trade. However, many aspects of the provenance of tin are still not resolved. A recent study in Science Advances 8(48) examined the historically significant tin ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck, which are key to the economy and long-distance trade of tin in the Late Bronze Age Mediterranean and beyond. Isotopic and chemical data of the objects was collected, from which a tin origin from Central Asia, particularly Mushiston in Tajikistan, and Anatolia was reconstructed. The study thereby proposed a solution to the long-standing riddle of tin provenance via scientific reasoning and comparative data. While this avenue of investigation is intriguing, this article maintains that the authors’ arguments do not support their far-reaching conclusions. Instead, it emphasises the similarities with Late and Middle Bronze Age tin ingots from Israel and Britain, and alternatively suggests a common origin of part of the Uluburun cargo with these items. South-west England is considered a very likely source region, but other tin ingots of the Uluburun wreck could also originate from Afghanistan and perhaps somewhere else.

Tin from Uluburun shipwreck shows small-scale commodity exchange fueled continental tin supply across Late Bronze Age Eurasia.

This paper provides the first comprehensive sourcing analysis of the tin ingots carried by the well-known Late Bronze Age shipwreck found off the Turkish coast at Uluburun (ca. 1320 BCE). Using lead isotope, trace element, and tin isotope analyses, this study demonstrates that ores from Central Asia (Uzbekistan and Tajikistan) were used to produce one-third of the Uluburun tin ingots. The remaining two-thirds were derived from the Taurus Mountains of Turkey, namely, from stream tin and residual low-grade mineralization remaining after extensive exploitation in the Early Bronze Age. The results of our metallurgical analysis, along with archaeological and textual data, illustrate that a culturally diverse, multiregional, and multivector system underpinned Eurasian tin exchange during the Late Bronze Age. The demonstrable scale of this connectivity reveals a vast and disparate network that relied as much on the participation of small regional communities as on supposedly hegemonic institutions of large, centralized states.

Tin from Uluburun shipwreck shows small-scale commodity exchange fueled continental tin supply across Late Bronze Age Eurasia

Tin from Uluburun shipwreck shows small-scale commodity exchange fueled continental tin supply across Late Bronze Age Eurasia

Glass ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck: Addition of glass cullet during manufacture and evidence for the changing context of New Kingdom Egyptian glass production in the late 18th Dynasty

Our recent LA-ICP-MS analyses of glass ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck along with additional samples from Egyptian sites, primarily Amarna, encourage us to question how and where the ingots were produced. Because almost all the approximately 200 glass ingots are either greenish blue, colored by copper, or purplish blue, colored by cobalt, we focus here on these colorants and their attendant trace elements. Based on the evidence for copper and antimony in cobalt-blue glass, we conclude that the most likely explanation is the addition of glass cullet during ingot production, in accordance with suggested evidence from glassmaking texts thought to date to the Late Bronze Age. By comparing the Uluburun ingots with glass from Amarna using multivariate statistics and trace element ratios, we determine that while a few of the ingots might be consistent with Amarna manufacture, the great majority are not, but rather represent production from other workshops, probably following those at Amarna. The importance of these workshops is suggested by our finding that over half of the cobalt-blue Mycenaean relief beads for which trace element data is available were made with Egyptian glass closer to that of the Uluburun ingots than to glass found at Amarna.

Glass ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck: Glass by the batch in the Late Bronze Age

The glass ingots from the Late Bronze Age Uluburun shipwreck (ca. 1300 BCE) provide crucial insight into Late Bronze Age glass production and exchange in the Mediterranean. Almost all of the approximately 200 glass ingots on board the ship were sampled as well as five of the 30 Mycenaean glass relief beads. Here we report the full chemical compositional results for these samples, along with 49 strontium isotope analyses representing at least 48 separate glass ingots. We include as well 355 unpublished analyses of Late Bronze Age Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Levantine, and Aegean glasses; these represent a total of 222 different objects since many of the core-formed vessel fragments are polychrome and each color was analysed separately. The results suggest that the Uluburun glass ingots were produced in as few as 28 discrete production events or batches. The largest batch included at least 16 ingots representing 40 kg of glass with a chemical composition as perfectly uniform as could be determined by our LA-ICP-MS analyses. Cluster analysis and comparison of Ti/Cr and Li/Zr ratios indicate that all of the ingots are Egyptian glass. In addition, based on this new dataset we have identified the first Egyptian glasses to be found at Mesopotamian sites as well as several examples of Mesopotamian glass used to produce Egyptian objects. The Mycenaean glass relief beads on board the ship were also produced with Egyptian glass, although in this case more similar to glass from Amarna than to the Uluburun ingots. These results, coupled with our finding that glass almost identical to ingots found on the ship was used to produce several of the unprovenanced Mycenaean relief beads from museum collections, presents a picture of overall technological continuity combined with geographic flexibility at the end of the Amarna Period in Egypt.

Glass Ingots from the Uluburun Shipwreck: Addition of Glass Cullet During Manufacture and Evidence for the Changing Context of New Kingdom Egyptian Glass Production in the Late 18th Dynasty

Glass Ingots from the Uluburun Shipwreck: Addition of Glass Cullet During Manufacture and Evidence for the Changing Context of New Kingdom Egyptian Glass Production in the Late 18th Dynasty

Glass Ingots from the Uluburun Shipwreck: Addition of Glass Cullet During Manufacture and Evidence for the Changing Context of New Kingdom Egyptian Glass Production in the Late 18th Dynasty

Glass Ingots from the Uluburun Shipwreck: Addition of Glass Cullet During Manufacture and Evidence for the Changing Context of New Kingdom Egyptian Glass Production in the Late 18th Dynasty

From peaks to ports: Insights into tin provenance, production, and distribution from adapted applications of lead isotopic analysis of the Uluburun tin ingots

Lead isotope analysis (LIA) can be applied to tin provenance studies when both the U–Th–Pb characteristics of cassiterite and potential Pb contamination are taken into account. As cassiterite (SnO2) contains higher concentrations of U than Pb and negligible Th, radioactive decay increases 206Pb/204Pb and 207Pb/204Pb ratios in cassiterite over time. However, 208Pb/204Pb ratio retains its primary value and can be correlated with LIA databases. A majority of documented Bronze Age tin ingots from Europe have Pb in excess of the 5 ppm maximum that can be derived from Cenozoic to Late Paleozoic cassiterite. A minute mass of galena (PbS) in the ore concentrate is sufficient to mask the cassiterite-derived lead, as would the addition of any lead contaminant introduced in the smelting/casting process. If the galena is cogenetic with the cassiterite, then LIA will be unaffected. The inclusion of uranium-rich minerals in the tin ore concentrate is another potential source of excess lead. In this case, the additional Pb is uranogenic, and so 206Pb/204Pb and 207Pb/204Pb will reflect the age of the uranium minerals, but 208Pb/204Pb will retain its primary value. If the U-minerals are cogenetic or coeval with tin mineralization, then a Pb isochron age will indicate the age of the ore.Between 1984 and 1994, at least 117 ingots, or roughly one tonne, of tin was raised from the Late Bronze Age Uluburun shipwreck (ca. 1320 B.C.). Over half of the analyzed ingots from this wreck site have high Pb concentrations (>100 ppm), indicative of contamination from non-radiogenic lead associated with lead metal or galena. LIA indicates that the Pb originated from the Pb–Ag-rich Bolkardağ region of the south-central Taurus Mountains. A second group of approximately 28 tin ingots with lower Pb content (<100 ppm) contain additional uranogenic Pb but retain 208Pb/204Pb compositions that overlap with the ca. 300 Ma tin regions of Western Europe and Central Asia, with the most likely source being the Tienshan Mountains in Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.By compensating for previous uncertainty around the use of Pb isotopes for sourcing tin objects, it is now possible to contextualize the Uluburun tin ingots more securely within the metallurgical systems of the Central Taurus-Cilicia-Amanus axis. Recent scholarship has shown that tin production in the South-Central Taurus region had taken place at a scale not previously anticipated. Two parallel production systems appear to have been in place serving elite and common consumption networks via markedly different technologies. The South-Central Taurus and Cilician cities served as important components of maritime and terrestrial metal distribution around the eastern Mediterranean, providing a range of metals from a single geographical region.

Amarna and Uluburun: Reconsidering Patterns of Exchange in the Late Bronze Age

This paper sets out to combine the textual evidence from the Amarna letters with the archaeological evidence from the Uluburun shipwreck. The latter was most probably a Levantine vessel carrying an extraordinary quantity of commodities and prestige objects from Egypt and the Near East to a major palatial centre in the Aegean. Most of the scholarship has therefore taken the view that it represents an exchange of the same type as those described in the Amarna letters, and that the Aegean world should be inserted in the same system of diplomacy and gift exchange as the Near Eastern polities. What this scholarship has failed to acknowledge, however, is the fact that the Amarna letters do not contain a single mention of the Aegean. This paper, therefore, addresses this significant discrepancy between the textual and the archaeological evidence and argues that the texts and the shipwreck may be part of two different phenomena.

A Test of Time and A Test of Time Revisited: The Volcano of Thera and the Chronology and History of the Aegean and East Mediterranean in the Mid-Second Millennium BC

A Test of Time and A Test of Time Revisited: The Volcano of Thera and the Chronology and History of the Aegean and East Mediterranean in the Mid-Second Millennium BC

Mycenaean shipwright tool kit: its reconstruction and evaluation

The present study aims to answer questions of utility and efficiency, on the basis of archaeological evi- dence, of the nominated Mycenaean shipwright tool kit through experimental methods. The target set was estab- lished through the recording of archaeological data, exami- nation of the available findings, classification of the finds, gathering of the relevant sources (literature, iconography, archeological parallels and preserved traces), reconstruction of the findings (casting, elaboration of the metallic parts and reconstruction of the hafts), usage of the reconstructed tools and the evaluation of them qualitatively, quantitatively and ergonomically via the reconstruction of a segment of the Uluburun shipwreck hull. Knowledge of tool production of the Late Bronze Age has been furthered. Questions on the casting of the metal parts of tools and the elaboration of their different parts have been answered. The reconstructed tools appear suitable for use in pegged mortise-and-tenon joinery in shipbuilding by skilled woodworkers. Moreover, the reconstructed tools proved to be user friendly. Experimental methods proved useful in the allocation of efficient criteria for the use-based classification of tools. Functional differ- ences between the tools were shown, and questions on utility were answered. The Late Bronze Age shipwright, as master of his craft and tool use, could make new tools or adjust them to the demands of a particular job, as well as to his own body build. The range of tools used for shipbuilding in the Late Bronze period is comparable to those used today.

ULUBURUN – THE DISCOVERY AND EXCAVATION OF THE WORLD’S OLDEST KNOWN SHIPWRECK

The oldest and most exciting shipwreck ever discovered is that of a 15 metre Syro-Palestinian trading vessel whose cargo was sighted on the sea-bed by a sponge diver off a promontory called Uluburun, near Kas, on the south Turkish coast. The ship dates from about 1300 BC. According to Wachsmann (1998:xi) “The Uluburun shipwreck is without doubt the single most significant key to understanding Bronze Age seafaring”, and Bass (1998:49) adds that “few if any Bronze Age excavations in the past 50 years have been more important than the Uluburun shipwreck.”

The provenance of some glass ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck

The discovery of a Late Bronze Age trading vessel at Uluburun near Kaş off the Turkish coast offers exciting possibilities for our understanding of Bronze Age trade. On board the ship was a large consignment of glass ingots that were assumed to originate either from Mesopotamia or Egypt. This paper presents the results of major and trace elemental analyses of three deep blue and turquoise glass ingots from the Uluburun wreck, and for the first time securely demonstrates that their composition is consistent with an Egyptian origin. The compositional similarity of the glass ingots to glasses from the Mycenaean world suggests that Egypt was exporting to that region via trading ships such as that from Uluburun.

Uluburun shipwreck stowaway house mouse: molar shape analysis and indirect clues about the vessel's last journey

Human translocation by stowaway transport is the widely accepted vector of the current worldwide distribution of commensal rodents but its historical process has never been directly evidenced. The anecdotal find of the small murine (mice and rats) mandible among the wealthy cargo of the Uluburun shipwreck provide us with an unexpected opportunity to directly evidence the species associated with this stowaway and provide indirect clues regarding the ship's route. Taxonomic identification and geographic sourcing has been performed using outline molar shape analysis by Elliptic Fourier Transform comparing the Uluburun mouse molar phenotype with extant populations from eastern Mediterranean sibling species. Results showed that the mandible belonged to the house mouse ( Mus musculus domesticus) with significant phenotypic similarities with extant Syrian house mouse populations. These results provide the earliest direct evidence for stowaway transports highlighting the historical process of the house mouse invasion of the Mediterranean. Using modern behavioural comparisons, combined with archaeological and historical sources, it has been argued that the servicing port of Ugarit (Minet el Beida) was a likely step on the vessel's last journey.

The Conservation of Glass Ingots from the Bronze Age Uluburun Shipwreck

Various desalination, drying, consolidation and reconstruction strategies have been employed in the conservation of an unparalleled collection of Bronze Age glass ingots found on the Uluburun shipwreck, excavated by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA) between 1984 and 1994. Presented here are the results of a survey undertaken to determine the effects of these different treatments. Included is an in-depth description of the treatment of four ingots, as well as the use of different gap-filling materials: Paraloid ® B-44, Multiwax W-445, a cellulose powder/Paraloid ® B-72/fumed silica mixture and a two-part epoxy putty. A general treatment approach for ancient glass excavated from a marine environment is suggested based on the conservators' experiences, the findings of the survey report and the re-examination of treated ingots.

Aegean Interest on the Uluburun Ship

The inventory of elite manufactured objects and the large quantity of metal recovered from the Late Bronze Age Uluburun shipwreck mirror in many respects palatial gift exchange deliveries as they are recorded in the contemporary Amarna Letters. The excavator of the shipwreck proposes that two men of Aegean origin were on board and that the ship was sailing to the Aegean. By combining data generated from the Uluburun shipwreck with textual and archaeological evidence from the contemporary Near East and Aegean, this paper evaluates the plausibility of a diplomatic voyage en route to the Aegean tied to Mycenaean palatial enterprise.*

The absolute chronology of Late Helladic III A2 revisited

Recent dendrological and dendro/radiocarbon research has raised questions concerning dates previously proposed for the end of LH III A2 and the transition to LH III B. Moreover, further examination of the Mycenaean and Levanto-Mycenaean pottery from Kamid el-Loz in Syria has added relevant information, as has examination of the material from the Uluburun shipwreck and the Miletus excavation. Analysis suggests that the transition from LH III A1 to III A2 pottery takes place between 1390 and 1375 BC; the transition from LH III A2 to III B1 begins around 1330 BC at the earliest and ends around 1290 BC at the latest, with the main transition in many areas occurring no earlier than 1315–1305 BC.

Pomegranates in eastern Mediterranean contexts during the Late Bronze Age

The recovery of botanical remains from the late fourteenth-century BCE Uluburun shipwreck near Ka., Turkey, provides a unique opportunity to examine the consumable components of an eliteoriented cargo, which included numerous pomegranate seeds, skin fragments and flower parts. Examination of pomegranate-shaped objects and botanical remains permits investigation of the establishment and development of the pomegranate as part of the ‘package’ of elite and luxury items exchanged by Bronze Age eastern Mediterranean cultures.

The Ulu Burun Glass Ingots, Cylindrical Vessels and Egyptian Glass

This paper examines a possible Egyptian origin for the glass ingots discovered in the Ulu Burun shipwreck off the Turkish coast and seeks to relate them to cylindrical vessels believed to be ingot moulds from Tell el-Amarna. A preliminary distinction between types of Ulu Burun ingot is also suggested and a comparison made between the ingot moulds from Amarna and those from Qantir.