Its pretty much shore dives only now for winter as my boat came out a couple of weeks back and my mates came out just recently too. The only other news I have is that I went away for a bit to see my mum on Mersea Island-oh and a spell in the sun on Lanzarote. I did some mudlarking on Mersea during the recent low spring tides but now back to beach combing Scilly. Theres a couple of shorelines here that are being very disturbed indeed at present, as they are doing sea defence work there and it is currently totally changing the whole dynamic of the beaches involved. Therefore, its worth a little look every now and again to see if anything of interest turns up. The piece of pottery below was found on a recent dive and its the sort of thing that im hoping will turn up with all the disturbances. To the untrained eye, the sherd below dont look like much but it is in fact a fragment of ancient Greekware over 2500 years old and its the sort of thing that can be found at Scilly diving or beachcombing. If you look at the sherd you can see two legs and a hand of a figure holding a round object to the left. On the right is another hand holding what I now know is a bunch of grapes. The hand with the grapes is actually the arm of a second figure that is even less on view on the far right hand side. I know this because you can just make out the figures thumb which shows it to belong to the figure on the right. So how did ancient greek pottery get here? Well this has to be a fragment from a vase from the cargo of the shipwreck of HMS Colossus. It was found while bottle hunting due south of Nut Rock. I know from experience (and research) just how far the vases travelled away from the wreck site. There were 1500.............
...............such vases on the wreck returning from Italy in 1798; a cargo collected by and belonging to Sir William Hamilton. The vases were wrapped in putty which made them bouyant; so that when the ship had broken up, many of them simply floated off on the tide. Many went out to sea to be lost forever, whereas about 10 vases floated ashore onto the beaches of St Martins Island. Sir William Hamilton had to get his nephew to come to Scilly to buy those vases back off the locals whom had saved them in the surf. Many other vases would have eventually sank and thus are still hidden on the sea bed around Scilly somewhere. Many others would have come to grief on the rocks and reefs here too. This is also bore out by the fact that most of the fragments I have found over the years have all been well away from the Colossus wreck site. As I remember, the one immediately below was found many years ago about 400 yards away to the south of the site where some other items of wreck had come to rest too. Just look at the fabulous face on the right in this picture below- Going by what looks like a horn by his head, it could be the head of Theseus looking at the Minotaur; the half man half bull creature he defeated in Greek mythology.
My brother first alerted me to the fact that bits could be found high and dry on rocks away from the wreck when he found a sherd on a rock called the 'Hulman' between Tresco and Samson. From then I have been looking for them on the shore line here ever since while beach combing- and eventually I found a fragment, also near Tresco Island, on a reef called 'Tobaccomans Ledge'. The big curved piece below was the furthest I have found a sherd away from the wreck. I found it while drift diving between the North Bathlomomew reef and the Garrison shore line. Thats about a mile and a half away from the wreck! The diversity of places these bits and pieces have been found just proves that sherds could be located absolutely anywhere here. I believe some will one day be found by the eastern isles or in Crow Sound as that seems to be the direction many of them travelled first.
The three fragments below all came from the Wreck and all from the Bow site which is over on the Southard Well Reef. Strangely, I never found any on the Stern section of the wreck which is out in St Marys Roads, 400 yards away from the reef bow site. I dived the stern for years after finding it but strangely/sadly not one fragment turned up there-possibly buried out of sight in the deep sand. I went searching around the bow site for bits before it was re-protected and found two of the pieces below at that time. The other fragment (with the face on it) was gifted to me by a good friend who sadly died. He did not dive himself but had a fascination for Greek pottery. He told me he got it from a member of the salvage team who first found the bow site of this wreck back in 1979. It looked rather too perfect to me but I had no reason to doubt that it came from the ship. Then one day I found one small fleck that was just as crisp as it. (That fleck is shown below just above the gifted one). What I mean by 'crisp' is that it still retains some of its white decoration which is something that normally disappears first when under the sea; whereas the black slip on the vases is far more hard wearing-sometimes almost indestructible by comparison-which is why the black slip is clear to see on every piece. Also the edges are still sharp like its only just been broken-whereas most fragments found have slightly sea worn or rounded edges. This is encouraging as any whole vases still out there could well be found totally intact with perfect decorations still remaining. One can only dream! I say that but Scilly is one of the only places in the..
....world where one can find this type of 2500 year old type of pottery. Out there somewhere on the sea bed, will be whole vases buried in sand or just laying in bits among the rocks of the islands or reef tops here. I am convinced that one day I will accidentally drift over a whole vase. However, it may not look like a vase -no- I think it will look like a blob- a big ball of putty protruding from silt or sand and containing an intact vase. I wouldnt be at all surprised if the putty will be hardened by it being in contact with sand and reacting with it. Either that or an exposed vase, partially showing above the sand, will be sea worn- and that part of it still buried will retain its putty and thus still be in perfect condition beneath it. On my travels I never stop keeping my eyes open for this pottery every time I dive out in the Roads here or am walking the coast line. I expect to find bits during every dive but the reality is, its a very rare occurrence indeed- the few I have found over the years have gained over the 20 or so years. So when I do locate a fragment I am 'cock a hoop'. Bit sad really. Each to their own!
(All those fragments I have found and raised myself were declared to the Receiver of Wreck even when they came from nowhere near the wreck site itself.)
No comments:
Post a Comment