AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS—The wreckage of an early sixteenth-century ship was discovered by a team of workers who were salvaging containers that had fallen off a transport ship in Dutch waters, according to a report from NL Times. Dendrochronological analysis of the vessel’s wooden beams indicates the trees were cut down in 1536. The smooth-hulled ship is thought to have measured about 100 feet long, and to have been built in the Netherlands around 1540. When it sank, the ship was carrying a cargo of copper plates that bear the mark of the Fugger family, who had a monopoly on copper production at the time. The Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands is planning an archaeological investigation of the wreck site. To read in-depth about a seventeenth-century shipwreck found off a small Dutch island, go to “Global Cargo.”
