Posted on 07/15/2024 7:46:51 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The discovery of a ship, missing for five centuries, in a southwest African desert, filled with gold coins, is one of the most thrilling archaeological finds in recent times.
The Bom Jesus (The Good Jesus) was a Portuguese vessel that set sail from Lisbon, Portugal on Friday, March 7, 1533. Its fate was unknown until 2008 when its remains were discovered in the desert of Namibia during diamond mining operations near the coast of the African nation.
When it sank in a fierce storm, it was on its way to India laden with treasures like gold and copper ingots. Two thousand pure gold coins and tens of thousands of pounds of copper ingots were discovered on the Bom Jesus, almost all intact.
It is speculated that the Bom Jesus sank when it was pulled too close to shore in a storm off the coast of Namibia, causing the ship’s hull to collide with a rock and lean over, capsizing the vessel. As the coastline waters receded, the Bom Jesus reemerged in the desert.
The condition that the ship was found in suggests that the storm that caused the shipwreck was especially violent, although an absence of human remains (besides a few scattered bone fragments) in the site suggests that most of the crew on board survived the wreck or died at sea.
Ship discovered in the desert had valuable cargo apart from gold
Dr Noli, the chief archeologist of the Southern Africa Institute of Maritime Archaeological Research, said recently the coastline was notorious for storms so finding a shipwreck was hardly surprising.
However, it was a week into the excavation that a treasure chest laden with gold was found, with the coins indicating it had come from a Portuguese ship that had disappeared in 1533.
“It adds new meaning to the concept of the ship having being loaded with gold,” Dr Noli told News Com, Australia.
Further investigation revealed the discovery of bronze bowls, and long metal poles later found to be canons.
Dr Noli’s team also found a musket which he estimated to be at least 500 years old, and bits of metal which revealed a shipwreck was buried in the sand. It also found compasses, swords, astronomical tools, canons and even a time capsule. Silver coins were also found.
While little is known about the history of the Bom Jesus itself, it is speculated that the ship was part of a class of naval vessels that were larger, more efficient, and more durable than previous Portuguese and Spanish vessels in order to facilitate the longer-distance expeditions carried out by Portuguese fleets during this time.
Based on the contents of the shipwreck, Dr. Noli and other scholars believe the ship was on course for Western India from its home port in Lisbon, Portugal around the southern tip of Africa, a common route for similar Portuguese vessels during this time that carried the same cargo.
Today, the Bom Jesus is the oldest known and most valuable shipwreck ever discovered off the Western coast of Sub-Saharan Africa.
The area where the ship was found was called Sperrgebiet, or “forbidden territory,” after the hundreds of German prospectors who ventured to the region in search of diamonds.
Diamond company DeBeers and the Namibian government still run a joint operation in the area, according to CNN, and the area remains largely out of sight.
The remnants of the shipwreck remain protected by mining security, with limited numbers allowed onto the site. An idea for a museum has been proposed but it remains to be seen whether it will occur.
They left out the part about how a sea ship ended up on land in a desert or how far inland it is.
They had steel ships in the year 1533?!?
No wonder it was lost. Who would look for a ship in the desert?
Hoist all the sails and head for that land!!! We’re taking a new shortcut laddies!!!
Oh come on, everybody knows that Obama caused the seas to recede.
But they tell us the seas are rising!.......
A story that needed to be wriiten about by this man. Good stuff!!
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilbur_Smith
Wilbur Addison Smith (9 January 1933 – 13 November 2021) was a Northern Rhodesian-born British-South African novelist specializing in historical fiction about international involvement in Southern Africa across four centuries.
How could a ship that set sail from Portugal end up in a desert... Right, climate change rising sea levels...wait wouldn’t that mean the ship should be farther underwater than when it sank?
That’s a different movie.
This has the aura of an Indian Jones mystery. Image what Robert Louis Stevenson could have done with this material.
Sand dunes drift. Namibian coastline has lots of sand dunes.
A boat forced ashore on a sandy beach in a storm is quickly covered and ‘lost’. As tine goes by the sand builds up along the shore, extending the desert further into what was once ocean.
I preferred A TWIST OF SAND(1968) Wrecked sub, wrecked 1500s ship.
Anyone remember that old movie?
They’ve found paddle boat wrecks in corn fields in Nebraska and Iowa.
What caused the seas to recede
—
Recession is local most likely as is reclamation as storms, high winds and the sea push the sand around. Then there are plate tectonics pushing up or down (along with attendant earthquakes) - just a tiny bit, but on long sloping shallows it becomes significant over hundreds of years.
Point is there are many non-obvious factors that cause “apparent” sea level rise or fall.
The 8” and the 6 foot quote is just ridiculous.
Was that the movie with Dirk somebody as the hero? Happened on a river, looking for some ship connected with Pres. Lincoln, or am I total misremembering?
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