A Greek shipwreck from the ancient era has been found in the Gulf of Abou Qir, close to Alexandria, according to the European Institute for Underwater Archeology (IEASM).
The discovered wreck dates back to the Ptolemaic era and is more than 25 meters long. According to Franck Goddio, president of the IEASM, the ship sank after being hit by large blocks from the Temple of Amun. The temple was destroyed in the second century BC during a cataclysmic event. According to Goddio and others, the wreck of an ancient Greek ship was originally anchored at a canal dock when disaster struck.
The same blocks that sank the ship may have also aided in its preservation. The wreckage was pinned to the bottom of the channel, as reported by the divers who discovered it. As a result, the sunken ship began to fill with clay and debris, eventually sinking beneath the clay. The ship was only visible because of a sonar prototype known as a “sub-bottom profiler.”
These types of galleons are extremely rare, especially from this time period. So far, the only known ancient shipwreck from this period is the Punic ship Marsala from around 235 BC, and Hellenistic ships of this type and design were completely unknown to archaeologists until the discovery of this ancient Greek shipwreck. It is intriguing that the wreck shows signs of both Greek and ancient Egyptian construction, and because of this mixed construction, it is assumed that the ship was constructed in Egypt. The ship was most likely rowed and had a massive sail.
