2024-01-14 21:48:09
By Le Figaro with AFP
Published yesterday at 07:00, Updated yesterday at 20:48
Each part of the boat will be restored and consolidated before being returned to Croatia. The oldest entirely hand-stitched boat in the Mediterranean is preparing for its next voyage, after spending millennia on the floor of the Adriatic in Croatia. DENIS LOVROVIC / AFP
More than 3000 years old, this boat finally emerged from the waters revealing exceptional ancient know-how. It is currently being repaired and consolidated in France, a country that it will soon leave to return to its land of origin: Croatia.
It is more than 3000 years old, but 2024 will mark its rebirth: the Zambratija, the oldest sewn boat in the Mediterranean, will in a few weeks be brought from Croatia to France to be restored, and testify to the technical prowess of the ancient Histris tribe . “Already, having a boat, a vessel, at that time, was certainly a prestige for a tribal community”explains Ida Koncani Uhac, the underwater archaeologist who led the research. “But managing to build a boat like that, if we transpose that to today, is like successfully building a spaceship!”
When the wreck was first located, 150 meters from the shore and just 2.5 meters deep, scientists thought it was a Roman-era boat, built according to a ancient technique which saw the boards sewn together with tendons, roots or plant fibers. But to their great surprise, Carbon 14 analyzes give it more than 3000 years: it would have been built between the end of the 12th and the end of the 10th century BC, a transition period between the Bronze Age and the Age of iron. Years of scientific research followed, carried out in particular by experts from the archeology and ancient history research laboratory at the Center Camille Julianne (CCJ) in Aix-en-Provence, France.
This photo taken on December 11, 2023 shows restorer Monika Petrovic checking the salinity of a special pond where the remains of the Zambratija boat – a 3,000-year-old hand-stitched boat, the oldest discovered in the sea Mediterranean- are desalinated. DENIS LOVROVIC / AFP
“We can assume that it was a boat intended for fast navigation, along the coast or in the river straits of the northern Adriatic”, explains Ms. Koncani Uhac. This mastless boat was driven by seven to nine rowers, and used for rapid maneuvers at sea. It was on board these boats that over the following centuries the Histris would have carried out acts of piracy, by intercepting the boats of the Romans who transported grain to supply their troops.
A boat saved by the waters
The approximately 10 meter long boat, a third of which has been relatively well preserved, is believed to have been used by the Histris, a tribe that gave its name to the region, Istria. The boards were sewn together with plant fiber ropes which have not been preserved, but their traces remain visible on the wood. According to historians, the Histris used an evergreen shrub – the Spanish broom (Spartium junceum) – to sew their boats.
Getting it out of the water was a very delicate operation. It was first protected by a metal hull designed for the occasion, then, last July, the Zambratija – in 15 pieces – was brought to the surface. Each piece was then carefully cleaned, analyzed and marked before being placed in a specially constructed pool to be desalinated. “We measure the salinity of the water and in about two months, the Zambratija will be ready for the next phase of conservation, in Grenoble”explains restaurateur Monika Petrovic to AFP, proudly looking at what she jokingly calls “our wooden boards”.
Once the final French stage is completed, the Zambratija is expected to return home to be displayed near the sea that has protected it all this time. The wooden planks have thus spent the millennia covered with algae and sand, a marine mud which has protected them: anoxic, that is to say without oxygen, it does not allow the development of bacteria which would destroy the wood.
Sasa Radin grew up in the village of Zambratija, after which the boat was named. “We had known for decades that it was there, we dove there when we were children” he says. “But we didn’t know he was that old.”
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