Abstract
When asked to review Steward Gordon’s A History of the World in Sixteen Shipwrecks, I eagerly accepted. I frequently teach a shipwreck archaeology class at my university which focuses on the historic period in the Americas, and I had been looking forward to reading this volume to see if it would be appropriate to use for a course incorporating wrecks from other periods and regions of the world. The concept behind the book is compelling: the use of wrecks to illustrate different periods of history by examining the wreck itself, and then placing it within a broader socio-economic context. In doing so, Gordon asks broader questions such as, what was onboard the ship and why, where did it come from and where was it bound, who financed it, who sailed on it, and what can we infer about the surrounding society’s contacts and interchanges? The author states that his primary interest is in exploring how small, ancient maritime worlds slowly merged into broader regional phenomena, and ‘finally into the single, unified global maritime world’ (p. viii).
The range of sites discussed in the book is impressive, beginning with the Dufuna dugout that was discovered in Nigeria and dates to 8000 years ago, to the modern disasters of the Exxon Valdez (1989) and the Costa Concordia (2012). The author admits that he includes examples of watercraft other than catastrophic shipwreck sites; several of the vessels discussed were not technically lost in wrecking events, including the Khufu barge (funerary craft), the Sutton Hoo ship burial, and the Maimondes Wreck (actually an account of a wreck that has never been archaeologically located). The concept generally works well and generates a series of very readable chapters perhaps better suited to the lay person looking to learn more about vessel designs through time and the maritime cultures that produced them rather than an academic audience. Still, the format allows Gordon to delve deeper into issues surrounding a specific vessel. For example, in the first chapter, after describing the discovery and analysis of the Dufuna canoe, he continues with sub-sections on dugout canoes in the post-ice-age world, how to make a dugout canoe, the limitations of this design, dugouts in other world areas, the end of the historic dugout canoe, and modern uses of similar craft. As such, this allows him to explore the broader context of a specific vessel type than would be possible in a more traditional site report or vessel history.
Actual shipwrecks in the volume include the famous Ulu Burun Bronze Age wreck site, which sank over 3000 years ago, and was one of the earliest wrecks to be excavated scientifically by archaeologists (George Bass and the Institute of Nautical Archaeology). The fact that it was studied following established archaeological practices is fortunate, because the ship carried an astounding variety of luxury goods from multiple trading ports in the Mediterranean. These included raw goods such as copper ingots from Cyprus, a ton of terebinth resin contained in Canaanite jars, and elephant and hippopotamus ivory. Finished goods were even more impressive, and archaeologists recovered bronze weapons, drinking cups, Canaanite jewelry, glass beads, and a bronze female statuette partly covered in gold. Taken as a whole, the site represents the types of luxury goods typically traded by wealthy merchants or royalty, and likely was operated by a Syro-Canaanite crew. The entire collection was painstakingly recovered from a depth in excess of 150 feet (45 metres), and has been conserved and is still being studied today for information on seaborne trade during the Late Bronze Age.
Another wreck site included in this study is the Intan wreck, discovered in the mid-1990s after looted artifacts began showing up in markets in Jakarta, Indonesia. After the looters were arrested, salvage of the site was turned over to a commercial salvage company, who found that there were still substantial numbers of artifacts on the site. Pottery suggests a date of around 1000 CE. A primary component of the cargo consisted of thousands of pounds of tin, and other evidence suggested that this was a typical sailing ship carrying goods between Sumatra and Java. There were luxury items onboard, such as silver, mirrors, and beads, and multiple sets of scales and weights makes it likely that traders were making the journey as well. Not everyone made it off; over 40 human bones indicate that some of the crew could not get free of the wreckage, or that perhaps the ship carried slaves who were unable to escape. Unfortunately, this site was worked by private salvors with the intention of selling at least some of the cargo. A cursory web search provided no information as to the current state of the collection, there is apparently no public access to it for study, and no indication that it will be properly analysed prior to being sold (one crew member does mention that he was given samples of the pottery as keepsakes). This brings up an ethical dilemma that separates archaeology from commercial salvage; these sites are finite resources, and most archaeologists follow the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage statement that underwater cultural heritage should not be commercially exploited. The two examples noted here, the Ulu Burun shipwreck and the Intan wreck site, offer two very different approaches to the study and preservation of these limited insights into maritime trade of the ancient world. Although it was clearly not the intention of the author to get into this debate, those willing to do a bit of background research on the respective sites will find a compelling case for the archaeological study of these irreplaceable resources.
As a whole, Gordon’s A History of the World in Sixteen Shipwrecks is an informative read in a compelling format, allowing the author to widen his focus from specific maritime sites to their broader contexts during the time periods in which they operated. Considering the antiquity of maritime activities (the oldest example of watercraft predates the Dufuna canoe by two millennia, and there is ancillary evidence of maritime migrations much earlier), it would be difficult to limit one’s selection to only 16 sites. But Gordon has succeeded in bringing important wrecks to light and showing that their importance extends far beyond their strictly maritime realms.