In the end, the best we can do without photo-modeling probably bears the same relationship to the shipwreck as a 13th century AD map of the Mediterranean bears to a 21st century satellite image (we made a little ‘medieval’ map of the site just to give you an idea). But all the important information has been obtained: the amphora types, the fine ware, and the anchors. Since the bulk of the material clearly belongs to our 7th century Byzantine ship, it will be recorded under that entry in the SOA shipwreck database. Everything else, while it may indicate an undiscovered shipwreck deeper and further out, will be recorded as an ‘isolated find’ in our locus database.
It is possible that some of the solitary amphora types on our site were discarded there by modern fishing boats, once they ended their usefulness as water containers. Some of the many anchors here and along the cape would have been lost in the day-to-day business of mooring. And we must always keep in mind that an untold number of ancient coastal traders were relatively small, and have left minimal traces in the archaeological record. The Hellenistic Thasos harbor inscription (SEG 17.417) defines a ‘small’ ship as anything under 3,000 talents (= 80 tons) burden, with the implication that there were a large number of smaller ships creating congestion in the city’s inner harbor. Roman senators were forbidden to own a ship with a capacity of more than 300 amphoras (Lex Claudia, 218 BC) but this is an outside limit. The majority of small vessels perhaps carried only a handful of amphoras as cargo, or for the use of the crew. A few ships of this kind may have shared the grave of our Byzantine amphora carrier, adding a couple of pieces to the underwater museum. Most likely we will never know for sure.
A site like this will probably never be excavated; it is simply too disturbed. However, based on the work we have done, the Ministry of Culture or a future survey team may choose to raise some of the artifacts we have discovered for further study and conservation. In the meantime, we can try to understand our shipwreck by comparing it to fully excavated ships of the same period. In the case of this site, we are fortunate to have the early 7th century Yassi Ada shipwreck mentioned previously (20-8-01). This ship was 20.5m by 5.2m and of about 60 tons burden, and carried an estimated 1000 amphoras in two basic shapes. Study of
the hull revealed a combination of shell-first and frame-first construction, providing a unique insight into the evolution of Mediterranean
ship-building. The Yassi Ada ship carried 9 anchors, 7 of which were stacked forward of the mast. Working out the number of anchors that belonged to our ship will help us to make a guess at its size. All in all, you’d be surprised at the amount of information we can get from even the most badly damaged shipwreck in a very short time, thanks largely to our various imaging gadgets. But for all our high technology, we have not yet worked out a way to stop fish gate-crashing our site and getting into our photos. At least this gives us the opportunity to share a fun game we’ve invented called "SPOT THE SCORPION FISH". Simply find all four scorpion fish hidden in today’s images, or die a horrible agonizing death.
