Mysterious 500-year-old ship from the Elizabethan era discovered on English Channel coast

Last year, the remains of an old ship was discovered in Quarry Lake along English Channel coast in southern England. As per a press release by WessexArchaeology, the remains of the ship were recovered by their marine archaeologists for examination.

After testing the wood from the vessel, the archaeologists have been able to ascertain that the ship is 500 years old, and dates back to around 1558-1580. This means, the origins of the ship can actually be traced back to the Elizabethan era.

Very few such English-built 16th-century vessels have managed to survived till the present time-period, making this is a great opportunity for scholars to learn more about this period that saw a huge expansion in international maritime trade and transport.

Background of the discovery

The remains of this ship were first discovered back in April 2022, when a construction materials supply company CEMEX UK were carrying out operations in the location. Once they ran into the timbers of the vessels, they alerted the Kent County Council, who took steps to recover the remains through Wessex Archaeology, which supplied funding and support to excavate and recover the ancient ship.

Over 100 timbers from the ship's hull were recovered by scientists who then used dendrochronological analysis on the timbers to study them.

Importance of the find

Archaeologists are still unsure how the ship ended up in that particular location where it was found, and are conducting further examinations on the ship, whose name has yet to be identified.

As per Andrea Hamel, Marine Archaeologist at Wessex Archaeology,

To find a late 16th-century ship preserved in the sediment of a quarry was an unexpected but very welcome find indeed. The ship has the potential to tell us so much about a period where we have little surviving evidence of shipbuilding but yet was such a great period of change in ship construction and seafaring.

The story of this rare Elizabethan ship was also featured on Digging for Britain on BBC2 on 1 January 2023.

Sources used:

Wessex Archaeology: ‘Rare Elizabethan ship discovered at quarry 300 metres from the coast’