2500 years old ship found in Ionian coastline

One of the most forgotten coastlines in Europe, part of the wonderful Ionian coast unearthed lost treasures and ships wrecked dating back over 2500 years ago. During the past two summers, American and Albanian experts have observed the waters of southern Albania, using special equipment to find ancient ship wrecks. At least five sites are located in what is called the first underwater archaeological research in Albania. It is expected that further research will enlighten the emerging techniques of shipbuilding during ancient times. This project could not have been imagined just 18 years ago, when this small Balkan country was still under the communist regime, which had banned all contacts with the outside world.
“Albania is an untapped archaeological source”, – said American archaeologist, Jeffrey G. Royal- What we have discovered so far, assures us that Albania is at the same level with Italy and Greece”.
The last expedition discovered traces of four sunken Greek ships, belonging to the 6th century and 3rd century B.C, while three other areas that allegedly hold more mystery will be verified. Unlike this year, 2007 led the archaeologists to signs of only one wrecked ship. “Findings are very important due to the lack of documents for that period”, – said Andrej Gaspari, an archaeologist of the underwater world from Slovenia. “The only ship found and documented at the time belongs to the Western Mediterranean and Israel, and our knowledge in the technology of shipbuilding at the period is very limited.” Albania represented a significant route where commercial ships passed from Greece, Italy, North Africa and the Western Mediterranean. Some of the objects found included tiles, anchors and jars about 50 cm long used to transport oil and wine. These are thought to have been produced in Corinth Greece, belonging to the 6th or 5th century BC. They were found in a merchant ship about 3 km from the Albanian coast.
Albanian archaeologist Adrian Anastasi has confirmed that the objects are dated to the 6th century BC. There are some suspicions amphoras belonging to the 4th century, the wine jar is thought to be African and perhaps belongs to 1st or 3rd centuries AD, while the anchor of stone is said to be Roman, and probably dates back to the 2nd to 1st century BC.
The team of archaeologists, working in the southern city of Saranda, has discovered over 20 unknown ship wrecks that are from the 20th century.
Anastasi considers the discovery of some old roof tiles that were part of the ship load to be quite unique. “A ship with a large cargo of roof tiles has never been revealed before. Their number and the way in which they are located, shows clearly that the ship is below them” he said.
Anastasi also added that the same type of roof tiles that are 73 by 52 centimeters have been discovered during excavations at one of the ancient sites west of Albania. He said that the ship was apparently loaded near the Greek island of Corfu and probably sunk on her way to a Corinthian colony in Albania.
To protect these discoveries, the team of archaeologists has not disclosed the exact location of these findings. “I’ve always said that if all the materials we have discovered were to be extracted from water, we will have a new museum for them. So far we’ve controlled about 217 miles of the coastline” – said the head of this mission, George Robb. During the next five years the archaeologists plan to control 354 kilometers of the Albanian coast, from the south border of Greece to the northern border with Montenegro.