Human skeleton found on famed Antikythera shipwreck

nature ^ | 19 September 2016 | Jo Marchant

[BenLurkin]

Foley and the archaeologists, meanwhile, are elated by the chance to learn more about the people on board the first-century bc ship, which carried luxury items from the eastern Mediterranean, probably intended for wealthy buyers in Rome.

The skeleton discovery is a rare find, agrees Mark Dunkley, an underwater archaeologist from the London-based heritage organization Historic England. Unless covered by sediment or otherwise protected, the bodies of shipwreck victims are usually swept away and decay, or are eaten by fish. Complete skeletons have been recovered from younger ships, such as the sixteenth-century English warship the Mary Rose and the seventeenth-century Vasa in Sweden. Both sank in mud, close to port. But “the farther you go back, the rarer it is”, says Dunkley.

Only a handful of examples of human remains have been found on ancient wrecks, says archaeologist Dimitris Kourkoumelis of the Greek Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities, who collaborates with Foley. They include a skull found inside a Roman soldier’s helmet near Sardinia, and a skeleton reportedly discovered inside a sunken sarcophagus near the Greek island of Syrna (although the bones disappeared before the find could be confirmed).

[blueplum]

I wonder if they’ll be able to extract some DNA to type the remains?

[BenLurkin]

I’ll check it out.

[SunkenCiv]

Note: this topic is from 9/19/2016. Thanks BenLurkin for posting the topic, and thanks Tennessee Nana for the ping.

That device was a remarkable find. I still find it hard to believe how advanced it was. Also the quality of the metal work was beyond what anyone thought possible. -- yarddog

I say that mechanism was dropped onto the wreck site centuries later off a different ship. Sunken Civ disagreed. -- BenLurkin

Really? I don't remember that exchange. :^) There is nothing but Greek writing on the device, and one reconstruction even nailed down the range of years during which the machine would display correctly.

• Scientists Unravel Mystery of Ancient Greek Machine [2006]
• Enigma of ancient world's computer is cracked at last [2006]
• Scientist tackles mystery of ancient astronomical device [2015]
• The World's First Computer May Have Been Used To Tell Fortunes [Engraved text translation] [2016]
• Ancient Greek 'computer' came with a user guide [2016]

[Tennessee Nana]

Thanks SC

Glad to see you back

:)

[Abathar]

The FBI a few years ago came out and searched my neighbors property in Milford, in fact right across the street from my in-laws home.

Be kind of cool if they found him there, I was hoping they would.

[Mr. K]

It was encased in enough sea-critter goo as to not be possible to be a new addition to the wreck, if I understand it correctly. It matched all the surrounding wreck material, or would have been identified as something newer.

Still, even if it was newer than the original wreck- it had to be hundreds of years old.

They found it in the early 1900’s and did not even know what was inside until the invention of X-Ray machines.

[rdl6989]

I love stories like this.

[SunkenCiv]

And though from last year, it seemed really appropriate since we're now at Halloween..

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks TnN!

[ABN 505]

Excellent series on utube about the Antikythera mechanism and also a series about rebuilding a copy by a superb machinist.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ML4tw_UzqZE&list=PLZioPDnFPNsHnyxfygxA0to4RXv4_jDU2

[flaglady47]

I would like to know the follow-up. The DNA testing should have taken place a year ago, and what were the results of the test? Inquiring minds want to know.

[KamperKen]

That device was a remarkable find.

I saw it in the National Museum in Athens and the exposed metal parts struck me as being the product of at 19th century machine shop.

[yarddog]

I would love to be able to handle it and study it in detail including the X-Ray and whatever tests they have made of it.

I am not sure if you are agreeing with me or you think it was made much later.

I think the sort of things it was capable of predicting or measuring would have been very valuable around the time of Christ, but charts, books, telescopes, chronometers, etc. would have been used by the 19th century.

[KamperKen]

I didn’t mean to imply that it had been made in the 19th century when I said it looked like the product of a 19th century machine shop. I agree with you that the device had been made in antiquity.