A Seventeenth century Swedish Navy shipwreck buried underwater in central Stockholm for 400 years has all of a sudden change into seen as a consequence of unusually low Baltic Sea ranges, marking the most recent centuries-old vessel to be discovered within the nation’s waters.
The picket planks of the ship’s well-preserved hull have since early February been peeking out above the floor of the water off the island of Kastellholmen, offering a transparent image of its skeleton.
“We now have a shipwreck right here, which was sunk on goal by the Swedish Navy,” Jim Hansson, a marine archeologist at Stockholm’s Vrak – Museum of Wrecks, informed AFP.
Hansson mentioned consultants consider that after serving within the navy, the ship was sunk round 1640 to make use of as a basis for a brand new bridge to the island of Kastellholmen.
Archeologists have but to establish the precise ship, as it’s one in all 5 comparable wrecks lined up in the identical space to type the bridge, all relationship from the late sixteenth and early Seventeenth centuries.
“This can be a answer, as a substitute of utilizing new wooden you should use the hull itself, which is oak” to construct the bridge, Hansson mentioned.
“We do not have shipworm right here within the Baltic that eats the wooden, so it lasts, as you see, for 400 years,” he mentioned, standing in entrance of the wreck.
Jonathan NACKSTRAND /AFP through Getty Photographs
Elements of the ship had already damaged the floor in 2013, however by no means earlier than has it been as seen as it’s now, because the waters of the Baltic Sea attain their lowest degree in about 100 years, in line with the archaeologist.
“There was a extremely lengthy interval of excessive strain right here round our space within the Nordics. So the water from the Baltic has been pushed out to the North Sea and the Atlantic,” Hansson defined.
A analysis program dubbed “the Misplaced Navy” is underway to establish and exactly date the big variety of Swedish naval shipwrecks mendacity on the underside of the Baltic.
A number of wrecks and relics have been discovered within the area in recent times.
In April 2024, researchers exploring an historical shipwreck off the coast of Sweden found centuries-old artifacts, together with a weapons chest and items of armor.
In July 2024, a workforce of divers found a large haul of champagne and wine on a shipwreck on the ground of the Baltic Sea off Sweden. The valuable cargo was later declared off limits by the federal government.
In October 2022, Swedish maritime archaeologists found the long-lost sister vessel of the enduring Seventeenth-century warship Vasa, which sank on its maiden voyage. The Vasa has been on show in Stockholm for the reason that Sixties after being salvaged from the ocean flooring.
