Discovering two rare timber masts from ancient ships has proved to be the highlight of a recently concluded excavation of what appears to have once been a Roman harbour at Fizine in Slovenia.
Underwater archaeologists from the University of Ljubljana have been reporting on their discoveries, after completing the final phase of the seven-year investigations into what had been regarded as less-promising parts of the site.
The Fizine site lies near the town of Portorož on Slovenia’s Adriatic coast, south of Trieste. Since 2017 divers from the university’s Faculty of Maritime Studies & Transport have been excavating the site, with the final phase of the field research started last November and concluding in late February.
The work was carried out in consistently poor visibility, and the latest findings confirmed those of previous years, say the archaeologists.
The intact Roman-era layers of the site have been found to contain more than 3,000 fragments of imported amphoras, kitchen and fine tableware from the late Antiquity period (250-750 AD), as well as sigillata, a type of Roman pottery mass-produced around the 1st century AD.
Most unusual were the remains from ancient ships, including rigging components, part of a sail and the two masts. The first to be discovered was about 1m long, made of fir and with an integrated oak pulley, while the second was longer at 1.5m and made of spruce.
Such finds are said to have been rare in the Mediterranean area. A quantity of timber stakes were also uncovered.
The Bernardin Beach location is described as exceptionally sheltered, suggesting that in late Antiquity a small harbour had existed there, complete with a pier or breakwater and mooring posts. Archaeologists and scientists from other disciplines are now evaluating all the evidence obtained from the site.
The timber artefacts are being conserved using melamine resin, and all the excavated materials have been stored further north at the Maritime Museum in Piran. Two other Roman sites have been discovered in the Fizine area, a settlement on land and another under water.
Slovenia has one of the longest traditions of underwater exploration in Europe, according to the national tourist board, with the first excavation having been carried out in 1884 in the Ljubljanica River.
Since the early 1960s, underwater archaeology has been carried out by various museums and institutions, which were brought together by the Institute for Underwater Archaeology (ZaPA) in 2013.
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Enjoyed the images, would love to have seen some video coverage of them uncovering some of those artifacts. Maybe next time…. :)