New international mission ready to explore Antikythera shipwreck

By Margarita Pournara

Around two-and-a-half years ago the National Archaeological Museum inaugurated “The Shipwreck of Antikythera: The Ship – the Treasures – the Mechanism.” The exhibition on the wreck that went down in the second quarter of the 1st century BC – taking with it artworks, coins and other artifacts, along with the world’s oldest known analog computer, the “Antikythera mechanism” – was so successful that it prompted scientists and archaeologists to revisit the location where the shipwreck had been discovered, just off the coast of Antikythera in the southern Aegean.

An event was recently organized to mark the closing of the exhibition in Athens, before it travels to Switzerland, where it will go on display in 2015. The speakers at the event included the president of the National Archaeological Museum, Dr George Kakavas, Theodosios Tassios, professor emeritus of engineering at the National Technical University of Athens, Basel Museum of Ancient Art director Dr Andrea Bignasca, and Dr Brendan Foley, chief researcher at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. During the event, a large-scale expedition to the shipwreck was announced, which will run for a month from September 15, bringing together Greek and international experts. With the aid of new technology, the archaeologists and scientists will dive down to the shipwreck, where they are expected to make great new discoveries.

Two studies of the wreck have already been made – by the sponge divers from the island of Symi who discovered the site with the support of the Royal Navy in 1900-01, and French marine archaeologist Jacques-Yves Cousteau in 1976 – but the latest dives are expected to get much closer to the wreck. Moreover, research conducted in 2012 and 2013 between...