An 800-year-old merchant boat raised from the South China Sea on
Friday is well protected, an expert said in Yangjiang, Guangdong
Province on Saturday.
An early examination showed the 30-meter-long vessel, "Nanhai
No. 1", wrapped in a huge sealed steel box with tons of seawater
and silt, was "perfectly protected" during the lifting process,
said Wu Jiancheng, chief of the archaeological project.
"We haven't seen any silt or water leakage from the box. The
boat is still in almost the same environment as it has been over
the centuries."
The box carrying the boat was raised to the surface on Friday
for reinforcement and was fully hoisted out of the water on
Saturday morning.
The whole salvage process went smoothly and the box was neither
shaking nor leaning, according to Wu.
The barge carrying Nanhai No. 1, meaning "South China Sea No.
1", was to be temporarily docked on Sunday. The boat was then to be
put on a huge air bed and sent to a specially-built museum,
according to the salvage plan.
"The boat is expected to arrive at its new home in two or three
days," Wu said.
Plans called for the boat to be placed in a glass pool at a
specially- built museum named the "Crystal Palace" where the water
temperature, pressure and other environment al conditions were the
same as where the ship had rested on the sea bed.
The pool was 64 meters long, 40 meters wide and 23 meters high.
It contained seawater and was about 12 meters in depth.
"It will be sealed after the ship and the silt are put in," said
Feng Shaowen, head of the cultural bureau of Yangjiang City,
Guangdong Province.
"The excavation work will not be carried out immediately and it
may last quite a long time. We want to make sure before carrying
out any excavation."
Guangdong has earmarked 150 million yuan (20.3 million U.S.
dollars) to build a "Marine Silk Road Museum" to preserve the
salvaged ancient ship.
The new museum, run by the Yangjiang municipal government, was
expected to open to the public by the end of next year. Visitors
would be able to watch the on-going excavation of the ship through
windows on two sides of the pool, Feng said.
Discovered in the summer of 1987 off the coast near Yangjiang
City, Nanhai No.1 was recognized as one of the oldest and biggest
Chinese merchant boats sunk at sea.
To date, archaeologists had recovered more than 4,000 containers
made of gold, silver and porcelain, as well as about 6,000 copper
coins from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) when the boat was built.
Wu estimated that there were still 60,000 to 80,000 items on
board.
According to Huang Zongwei, a professor with the Guangdong-based
Sun Yat-Sen University, the boat was proof of the existence of a
"Marine Silk Road".
As early as 2,000 years ago, ancient Chinese traders began
taking china, silk and cloth textiles and other commodities to
foreign countries along the trading route. It started from ports at
today's Guangdong and Fujian provinces to countries in southeast
Asia, Africa and Europe.
"The 'Marine Silk Road', like the ancient Silk Road that
connected China with south, west and central Asia and Europe, was
also a bridge for connecting Eastern and Western cultures," Huang
said. "But evidence for existence of the path was rare."
(Xinhua News Agency December 23, 2007)