Replies

some reprises and other quotes, related to the Ulu Burun wreck which inspired this recreation: emphasis added:

Dendrochronological Dating of the Uluburun Ship
by Dr. Cemal Pulak
Institute of Nautical Archaeology
...The unique gold scarab of Egypt's Queen Nefertiti, Akhenaten's beloved wife, appears to be fairly worn from use, which suggests that it had been around for some time before it was taken on board the ship. Furthermore, it may have been part of a jeweler's hoard, as it was discovered in the midst of complete, cut, and folded jewelry pieces and other bits of scrap precious metals. If the scarab was a part of the scrap hoard, which is debatable, it almost certainly arrived on the ship after Nefertiti's time, when her scarab would have been worthless except for its gold value. Before the death of Akhenaten (or at latest the removal of the capital to Memphis), a scarab of the Queen would have been a venerated object unlikely to be discarded. On the other hand, it is difficult to imagine that the scarab would have long survived the eradication of all references to Akhenaten's family under Horemheb without being melted down.

In the hope of obtaining an absolute date for the ship, seven wood samples taken from the keel-plank, planking, and cedar logs were submitted to Peter Kuniholm of Comell University for dendrochronological dating. While some samples did not have a sufficient number of tree rings to match the established master sequence, others with more rings appeared not to match at all. A large log-like piece of undetermined purpose, but with its outer layers trimmed, yielded a date of 1441 B.C. ±37 years, the uncertainty factor arising from the carbon dating of samples constituting the floating master conifer-ring sequence. A small log or branch, presumably fresh-cut firewood, however, yielded a date of 1356 B.C. ±37 years, with an additional unmeasurable ring on the exterior. Kuniholm further reports that recent calibration curves, along with several other factors, allow for the modification of these dates by shifting the entire floating sequence to the extreme recent end of the ±37 years. This would then date the most recent sample on the wreck to 1319 ±2 B.C. or 1318 ±2 B.C., after taking into account the unmeasurable ring. It would appear, therefore, that the ship sank sometime after that date, but probably not much later.
Land Snails from an Ancient Shipwreck:
The Need to Detect
Wreck-Independent Finds
in Excavation Analysis
F.W. Welter-Schultes
January 2001
Abstract: Land snails recovered from shipwreck excavations can potentially provide information regarding human-based dispersal of the involved species and also contribute to hypotheses regarding a ship's route and geographical origins of some of its cargo. Such faunal material, however, must be subjected to critical study to ascertain whether they represent specimens originally associated with the ship itself or are simply elements introduced to the site after the ship sank. The excavation of a Late Bronze Age shipwreck at Uluburun, in southern Turkey, produced 36 land snails. Of these, 32 specimens are believed to have been on board the vessel in antiquity. Three other specimens represent an endemic Metafruticicolaspecies, which lives exclusively in a 10 km zone in the region of Uluburun. The proximity of the species' habitat to the shipwreck site suggests that these specimens are intrusive elements. The intrusive nature of a single Zonites specimen also recovered from the excavation is amply demonstrated by a detailed comparative study of Zonites specimens collected in the same locality. The last study, which involves the analysis of spatial shell variations of populations collected from 61 separate localities (totalling 367 specimens) within a 50 km area extending from Megisti (Kastelórizo) and Kas to Finike, suggests that: (1) Zonites beydaglariensis is conspecific with Z. caricus, and (2) the shipwreck specimen not only belongs to this species, but that it originates from a population on the rocky Uluburun peninsula 0·8–1·2 km north of the shipwreck site. The specimen was probably blown into the sea by a natural phenomenon and settled on the shipwreck site.

A date of 1305 BC for the Late Bronze Age shipwreck of Uluburun was trumpeted as confirmation of the generally accepted chronology... In the recent Science paper it was virtually retracted... Another date of 1621 BC for a wooden bowl from the Shaft Graves at Mycenae has been categorically withdrawn. -- Peter James, "The Dendrochronology Debate", Minerva, v13 n4 (July/August 2002), p. 18

Anatolian tree-ring studies are untrustworthy
by Douglas J. Keenan
30 October 2005
(pdf format)
The chronology of the Ancient Near East -- oftentimes called the "cradle of civilisation" -- is not well established... There is currently only one (substantial) master dendrochronology from anywhere in the Ancient Near East... In what follows, much of the work that has been done in Anatolian tree-ring matching is reviewed. The conclusions are disturbing, and have implications for tree-ring studies generally... The approach that was adopted for Anatolia, however, was to rely largely on what is called a "D-score". The D-score does not exist in statistics. It has been used solely with tree rings. D-scores do not have a mathematical derivation -- unlike t-scores, g-scores, and times series. In fact, D-scores were more or less just made up (in an unpublished 1987 thesis), and using them to evaluate a tree-ring match turns out to be little better than rolling dice...The most important of those dates was perhaps for wood from a shipwreck, which was claimed to resolve some of the debate about dates. (The shipwreck was found off Uluburun, southern Turkey [Pulak, 1997].) In 1998, some details on the shipwreck wood were published [Wiener, 1998: p.314]. It turned out that there had not been a good quantitative match against the Gordion master (by t-, g-, or D- scores)... Reliability is further lessened because one of the pieces was likely from the ship’s frame and the other was cargo [Pulak, 1997] -- so there is no evidence that the two trees grew at the same location and time. Thus the claimed "match" is even worse than Figure 3 indicates.) Figure 3. The shipwreck wood matched against the Gordion master dendrochronology. (This figure is given by both Kuniholm [1997: fig.7] and Manning [1999: fig.63].) In 1999, a letter was sent to various e-mail lists, and also to the principal investigator in Anatolian tree-ring studies, pointing out some of the above (especially the statistical aspects) and concluding that there was no tree-ring match for the shipwreck wood [James, 1999]. Two years later, in the next major paper in Anatolian tree-ring studies, the tree-ring date for the shipwreck was acknowledged to be "not especially strong" [Manning et al., 2001: n.38]. The paper also claimed, though, that further work might allow the date to be "confirmed"; this claim does not seem realistic... The shipwreck and the gateway are from two of many archaeological sites that are claimed to have been dated in Anatolian tree-ring studies. How bad are the others? The others have not been published in sufficient detail to be sure; indeed most have not been published at all -- the dates have simply been announced. That is, the shipwreck and the gateway were not chosen becaujse they are especially strong examples of bad practice, but because they are the two sites that have been published in greatest detail. There is only one other site that has been published in some detail.

...the shipwreck specimen not only belongs to this species, but that it originates from a population on the rocky Uluburun peninsula 0·8–1·2 km north of the shipwreck site. The specimen was probably blown into the sea by a natural phenomenon and settled on the shipwreck site.

...orrrrrr, the ship's home port (or one of the ports it frequented) was near the wreck site. That would be consistent with ancient wreck patterns so far known -- more than 99 per cent went down near coastlines, presumably looking for haven or for home during bad weather or bad visibility (or both). Crossing the Mediterranean was much less risky, and commonplace; whether most wrecks really happened near coastlines will be scrutinized in light of seafloor exploration, which has barely begun.

The late Willard Bascom was a mentor / idol of Robert Ballard. I saw this book at the library one day a few years ago, and as I read the prologue I realized who this guy was -- the prologue was quoted in a story about Ballard's finding of a Byzantine vessel in the anoxic (?) depths of the Black Sea. "It sits upright on the bottom, lightly covered by the sea dust of 2,500 years,” he wrote. "The wave-smashed deckhouse and splintered bulwarks tell of the violence of its last struggle with the sea. A stub of a mast still remains."

Deep Water, Ancient Ships:
The Treasure Vault of the Mediterranean
by Willard Bascom

[old file, didn't check the links to see if they work]