![]() ![]() Indeed, the area has proven to be a proverbial treasure trove for ancient Chinese shipwrecks some 136 underwater archaeological sites were discovered around the Xisha, Nansha, and Zhongsha islands in the South China Sea.ĭue to its proximity to the shipwrecks, Hainan quickly became a place where excavations could be efficiently organized. Discovered at Huaguang Reef (华光礁) in the Xisha Islands, the ship was assumed to be a merchant vessel that struck the reef and sank in one of the area’s many storms. According to experts, the boat had already suffered severe damage from robbers, who had taken most items of monetary value. When Chinese fishermen discovered a 20-meter-long boat only 3 meters underwater in 1996, nobody knew how many times it had been looted. There are now around 100 underwater archeologists in the country, 22 of whom are based in Hainan. To protect the treasures around its own coast, China created the Center for Underwater Archeology in 1987, which has since grown substantially. Realizing the massive money-making opportunity, others-from professional looters to poor fishermen-began to follow suit, finding shipwrecks and selling the valuable booty for profit. Although the Chinese government attempted to get the artifacts back, Hatcher reportedly profited some 20 million USD by selling the loot. The reason for China’s seemingly meteoric rise in underwater archeology lies in a little-known event of 1986, when British treasure hunter Michael Hatcher extracted Qing dynasty (1616 – 1911) porcelain from a Dutch ship near Indonesia. In 2010, it became the fifth country in the world to have a manned ship able to descend 1,000 meters under the sea. Within a relatively short amount of time, China has become a major player in underwater archeology. That is, however, just one aspect of this extreme and costly endeavor: China’s underwater archeological initiatives also include deep-sea excavations. So often is archeology associated with shovels and dirt sifters, it may be hard to imagine archeologists in wet suits and flippers, carefully unearthing shipwrecks on the ocean floor. Although the extent of the Song’s economic influence is still being unearthed, shards of Song porcelain have been found as far away as the east coast of Africa.ĭue to its location in the South China Sea, Hainan has been at the forefront of an exciting new field that aims to restore our knowledge of China’s ancient Maritime Silk Road: underwater archeology. The Song government sent merchants across Southeast and South Asia, establishing new and lucrative avenues. The Song responded by investing in a new solution: a maritime Silk Road, which quickly exceeded overland trade. During the earlier Han dynasty (206 BCE – 220 CE), Buddhism was introduced to China through India via this influential trade route.īy the time the Southern Song dynasty had rolled around, though, the overland Silk Road had become increasingly unsafe and expensive for merchants to travel due to political tensions in Central Asia. Material goods were not the only things to travel along the Silk Road, however ideas, philosophies, and religions spread like wildfire. ![]() In return for its tea, silk, and porcelain, China imported products from exotic places like Persia and India. ![]() For centuries, the Silk Road stretching westward across the Asian continent had been China’s lifeline to the rest of the world. It was the Southern Song dynasty (1127 – 1279) and the economy was booming-on the sea.
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