In 1999 the Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA) began the excavation of a 5th-century BC shipwreck off Tektas Burnu, a rocky headland on the west coast of Turkey between the Greek islands of Chios and Samos. The site was discovered in 1996 during INA's annual survey, which has pinpointed more than 100 ancient wrecks off southwest Turkey. Since 1960 teams under George Bass have excavated wrecks ranging in date from Bronze Age to medieval, but the high classical period of Greece remained unrepresented. Interest in the Tektas wreck was spurred by its likely date, in the third quarter of the 5th century BC; it is the only wrecked merchantman to be securely dated to these years, and is therefore shedding unique light on seafaring and trade at the height of classical Athens.
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Figure 1: 5th-century BC wreck at Tektas Burnu, Turkey, 1999: the site prior to excavation, showing intact amphoras. Depth 42 m. (Photo Don Frey/INA.)
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Figure 2: The site during excavation, showing the upper layer of amphoras and other pottery. Airlift visible upper left. Depth 42 m. (Photo Don Frey/INA.)
The wreck was visible as a mound of 60 amphoras in a sandy gully at 42 m depth. Over almost 2000 dives, from July to September 1999, the team excavated through the upper layer of amphoras and mapped the site using an innovative digital photogrammetry system. The indications are that the ship sank upright and settled intact, with its bow caught in a cleft of rock below the shoreline cliffbase. The presence of upright amphoras in deep sand suggests that the deposit may include substantial hull remains.
The excavated cargo comprised amphoras from Mende, in northern Greece, and others from Chios. The largest number were a pseudo-Samian form which may have been locally made. Although most of the amphoras probably held wine, a greater variety of contents is suggested, perhaps indicating re-use: two were filled with pitch and another with more than 100 butchered cattle bones, rare evidence for the transport of preserved beef in antiquity.
Other pottery included cooking vessels, a hydria, a fine table amphora, eight oil lamps, several black-glazed kantharoi (two-handled cups) and a nested group of four one-handled cups.
Some of these items, including the cups, may prove to be cargo, and the rest shipboard equipment; their concentration at either end and at the centre of the site may indicate the main galley and storage areas. A stone alabastron (perfumed oil jar) and two bone tiles, perhaps gaming pieces, may represent personal belongings. The central area also produced two halves of a lead anchor stock, the earliest evidence in existence for a metal anchor.
The most remarkable discovery from the 'bow' area was a white marble disk, 14 cm in diameter, with a metal bolt through its centre. This is now known to have been the ship's 'eye' or ophthalmos (Latin oculus). The closest parallels come from Piraeus, where marble eyes were found in a storage area of the 5th-century BC shipsheds used to house the triremes of the Athenian navy. It had been assumed that the apotropaic eyes seen on ancient ship depictions were usually painted directly on the hull. The Tektas ophthalmos is the first to be discovered in a wreck, and the first to be found associated with a merchant ship.
Figure 3: Intact band-painted jug raised from the site. (Photo Don Frey/INA.)
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Figure 4: Close-up of cooking pot and amphora base revealed during excavation. Depth 42 m. (Photo Don Frey/INA.)
The significance of this wreck lies not only in its unique assemblage, which will provide a more refined chronology for 5th-century BC pottery, but also in the unusually detailed historical backdrop; the context provided by the historian Thucydides, in particular, may allow a trading venture of this period to be seen in light of political and economic developments in the Aegean during the Age of Pericles.
The project is directed by George Bass and supported by the National Geographic Society, the US National Endowment for the Humanities, Texas A&M University and Turkish Airlines. It is the subject of a National Geographic TV Explorer programme first aired in the US on 21 November 1999. Further updates will appear in the INA Quarterly, which is sent to subscribing members of INA. For more information see the INA website.