17th-Century Treasure Ship Loaded With Silver and Cannons Found Off Spain

Analyses of the Delta I shipwreck. Credit: Government Delegation of the Andalusian Regional Government successful Cadiz

A sunken treasure ship carrying 27 cannons and 18 metallic bars has been recovered astatine the bottommost of the Bay of Cádiz disconnected Spain’s confederate coast. The 17th-century French vessel, provisionally named Delta I, held metallic cargo weighing astir fractional a ton.

The find came during dredging enactment for a caller instrumentality terminal astatine the larboard of Cádiz. Underwater archaeologists accidental it ranks among the astir important submarine discoveries successful Andalusia successful caller years.

Researchers Ernesto Toboso Suárez and Josefa Martí Solano, from the Andalusian Institute of Historical Heritage’s Center for Underwater Archaeology and the steadfast Gerión Arqueología, presented their findings astatine the First Ibero-American Congress of Nautical and Underwater Archaeology.

The vessel was built successful the Ibero-Atlantic contented and operated connected behalf of France. It carried Swedish-made artillery purchased done Dutch intermediaries, a communal statement successful Europe’s 17th-century arms trade.

Cannons and metallic bars recovered aboard sunken treasure ship

Archaeologists identified 5 antithetic cannon calibers, each dating to the 3rd 4th of the 1600s. Three of the cannons are missing captious parts, including muzzles and the pins utilized to equine them connected their weapon carriages.

Researchers suggest those weapons whitethorn person already been retired of work earlier the vessel sank and were carried arsenic ballast. Damage from combat oregon a pre-sinking incidental is besides being considered.

One of the silver bars bears an engraved day of 1667, giving researchers a notation constituent for erstwhile the vessel apt went down. The squad believes the metallic was being smuggled.

Spain’s Crown held choky power implicit precious metals arriving from the Americas, and Seville officially held the monopoly connected overseas commercialized astatine the time.

Cádiz, however, had grown into a engaged maritime hub. Its earthy harbor and dense oversea postulation made it charismatic for merchants looking to debar Spanish taxation authorities. The find supports the thought that overseas ships regularly moved done networks that bypassed authoritative oversight.

Dredging disturbed the tract earlier archaeologists could representation it

The archaeologists enactment that dredging had already disturbed the tract earlier the survey began. The archetypal presumption of the wreck and its contents connected the seabed could not beryllium afloat reconstructed.

The treasure vessel was raised successful July 2024 aft 4 months of underwater method and archaeological enactment by the Port Authority of the Bay of Cádiz. Divers worked astatine astir six meters extent successful debased visibility to cleanable the hull and hole it for extraction.

Engineers designed a metallic enactment framework to stabilize the vas during the lift. Floats raised it from the seabed, and crane teams transferred it to Dock 5.

There, researchers photographed, 3D-scanned, and catalogued each recovered piece. Wooden remains were stored nether controlled humidity earlier being returned to a protected country of the bay floor.

The ship’s nonstop individuality has not been confirmed. Researchers accidental aboriginal expeditions whitethorn supply last answers astir the vessel’s root and the circumstances of its sinking.