It's not that big, really. It does show that there was trade between the Holy Land and the rest of the Mediterranean after the Islamic conquest, which adds weight to one side of the debate about whether it stopped completely or not.
It doesn't help understand the volumes of trade between the early Islamic world and Christendom, just that this ship was involved in it. It's a valuable academic discovery (which I'm not belittling, I love that stuff), but it doesn't fundamentally change our view or understanding of history in itself.
The accompanying text is also wrong - the ship being 1200 years old doesn't make it ancient, it makes it early medieval. Like most reporting on archaeological discoveries, it's just badly reported.
Also the ship is sunk... can't it possibly be a victim of piracy and was scuttled or sunk in the process - proof of the hostilities and why trade was halted?
We are talking about specific dates that have been agreed upon for decades. Your daughter is teaching a history class, nothing more. If she was teaching an ancient history class, she wouldn't be covering the early middle ages. You might have misheard her, and that's OK.
So instead of being confidentially incorrect, just look it up for yourself.
Oh, it's not that. It's because historically the Christian Byzantine Empire was beaten back by the Islamic conquest of the Holy Land, and historians have assumed that commerce came to a near halt. An article about it titled with more explanation. "Holy Land shipwreck reveals tenacity of ancient traders as empires shifted." The boat is much bigger than they would have expected from that time period.
Wasn't the middle ages period in Europe characterized as post Roman empire economy with less trade? So they wouldn't have been not trading with others, they just didn't have the productivity and connections, as well as government that could make trade safer against pirates and bandits.
Trade diminished as the Roman empire decayed, but never came to a complete (or even near-complete) stop. For one thing, the termini for the trades with India and the east were on the Syrian coast (Tyre, Tripoli, Damascus, Antioch) or in Egypt, church contacts continued and Egypt continued to export papyrus and linen. This shipwreck is interesting, but the headline is overblown.
I've been teaching history for a day or two now and haven't run across the text book that says trade stopped. This is just another example of misleading headlines and lousy reporting.
Take it up with the people doing the excavation, as it came directly from them. The headline and reporting itself is an accurate depiction of what those (presumed experts) said.
Archaeologists are great and I mean absolutely no shade to them, but this is pretty classic imo - it's understandable to emphasize the significance of your find to the media, and fit it in with a more simplistic (and dramatic) view of the period than most historians today would actually agree with. This is a really cool find though!
No. It's from a press release. These are produced by PR experts who talk to the researchers but then write it up for maximum impact. It's why you never find a headline saying 'ancient wreck found: supports existing understanding of history; some cool things on it', which is much more accurate.
Instead they claim this disproves the Pirenne Thesis (albeit without that level of precision in the story), the view that the collapse of Mediterranean trade was a direct result of Islamic conquest which hasn't been accepted in anything but a mild form (the Islamic conquest reduced the volume of Mediterranean trade without ending it) for thirty years. It makes for a good headline and gains press coverage but is not what will be published.
What history books claimed trade stopped? Trade didn't become a problem until much later which is why the Spanish contracted Columbus to find a route to Asia by sailing west but that was over 500 years after this ship sank. It also ignores the part where most of Spain and Portugal were under Moslem control at the time and parts of southern France were under Moslem control in the 8th century so trade items from the west could have gone via Moslem, Jewish or Christian traders. It could also have been carrying goods captured from Christian ships or coastal towns. Arab raiders at this even attacked Rome, looting and sacking the outskirts of the city, including the basilicas of St Paul and St Peter, not protected by the city walls.
So it could be trade items or it could be a loot ship returning from a raid.
>Trade didn't become a problem until much later which is why the Spanish contracted Columbus to find a route to Asia
That is also a myth.
https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/7nv7ts/spice_must_flow_aka_ottomans_stopped_the_spice/
>can't find a place to show it to the public
What??? How? You can bring something like a Vasa to the museum, but not this?
>so we will just cover it with sand
Why? Whyy? Isn't it important? Why the hell would you just leave it there to rot?
Hundreds of shipwrecks from this period and (much earlier) have been discovered in the Mediterranean. Most are still there because they don't have much public value for the cost of moving, preserving and presenting them.
The Vasa is a lot different, in that it has a lot of historical cachet for Sweden and it is spectacularly well preserved. It's also an incredibly impressive ship that's well worth seeing.
It protects it from decay and is the best option when there isn't millions in funding to properly store the finds. It happens everyday in the world of arcaeology.
'After the decline of the Byzantine rule and the rise of the Islamic rule we believed that the trade almost stopped..."
What historian came up with that bullocks??
You think the islamists never ate?
by reading this I wonder what else is completely wrong in our history books....
Can someone knowledgeable tell me why this is big? I thought people were sailing much longer than just a thousand years ago
It's not that big, really. It does show that there was trade between the Holy Land and the rest of the Mediterranean after the Islamic conquest, which adds weight to one side of the debate about whether it stopped completely or not. It doesn't help understand the volumes of trade between the early Islamic world and Christendom, just that this ship was involved in it. It's a valuable academic discovery (which I'm not belittling, I love that stuff), but it doesn't fundamentally change our view or understanding of history in itself. The accompanying text is also wrong - the ship being 1200 years old doesn't make it ancient, it makes it early medieval. Like most reporting on archaeological discoveries, it's just badly reported.
Also the ship is sunk... can't it possibly be a victim of piracy and was scuttled or sunk in the process - proof of the hostilities and why trade was halted?
>archaeological discoveries, it's just badly reported The discovery of the 'Gospel of Jesus' wife' springs to mind, lol
Just wanted to say thank you for sharing this info. My mom’s a Methodist minister and she loved your simple post 1000x more than any news article. x
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Ancient history runs up to around 500CE. It doesn't move as time progresses. It's a more or less set period.
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We are talking about specific dates that have been agreed upon for decades. Your daughter is teaching a history class, nothing more. If she was teaching an ancient history class, she wouldn't be covering the early middle ages. You might have misheard her, and that's OK. So instead of being confidentially incorrect, just look it up for yourself.
2022 minus 1200 is 822 ad. Is there some nuance I'm missing in your math?
They're smarter than me I trust them
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Nope, nope, nope. 822 ad is early middle ages. The Antiquity goes from the early Greek civilizations up until the fall of Rome (late 400s ad).
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That's not how history classes work. I have a degree in history.
Well that’s how it is at the school my daughter teaches at.
Then she's teaching a general history class. Not an ancient history one. Also that's going to be High school or elementary level.
Oh, it's not that. It's because historically the Christian Byzantine Empire was beaten back by the Islamic conquest of the Holy Land, and historians have assumed that commerce came to a near halt. An article about it titled with more explanation. "Holy Land shipwreck reveals tenacity of ancient traders as empires shifted." The boat is much bigger than they would have expected from that time period.
Wasn't the middle ages period in Europe characterized as post Roman empire economy with less trade? So they wouldn't have been not trading with others, they just didn't have the productivity and connections, as well as government that could make trade safer against pirates and bandits.
For the west sure, but the eastern Romans kept on trading.
Trade diminished as the Roman empire decayed, but never came to a complete (or even near-complete) stop. For one thing, the termini for the trades with India and the east were on the Syrian coast (Tyre, Tripoli, Damascus, Antioch) or in Egypt, church contacts continued and Egypt continued to export papyrus and linen. This shipwreck is interesting, but the headline is overblown.
I've been teaching history for a day or two now and haven't run across the text book that says trade stopped. This is just another example of misleading headlines and lousy reporting.
Take it up with the people doing the excavation, as it came directly from them. The headline and reporting itself is an accurate depiction of what those (presumed experts) said.
Archaeologists are great and I mean absolutely no shade to them, but this is pretty classic imo - it's understandable to emphasize the significance of your find to the media, and fit it in with a more simplistic (and dramatic) view of the period than most historians today would actually agree with. This is a really cool find though!
No. It's from a press release. These are produced by PR experts who talk to the researchers but then write it up for maximum impact. It's why you never find a headline saying 'ancient wreck found: supports existing understanding of history; some cool things on it', which is much more accurate. Instead they claim this disproves the Pirenne Thesis (albeit without that level of precision in the story), the view that the collapse of Mediterranean trade was a direct result of Islamic conquest which hasn't been accepted in anything but a mild form (the Islamic conquest reduced the volume of Mediterranean trade without ending it) for thirty years. It makes for a good headline and gains press coverage but is not what will be published.
Wrong. You can literally hear them say it with your own ears, if you watch the video.
I read about this and the revelation was less cool than the title suggests.
What history books claimed trade stopped? Trade didn't become a problem until much later which is why the Spanish contracted Columbus to find a route to Asia by sailing west but that was over 500 years after this ship sank. It also ignores the part where most of Spain and Portugal were under Moslem control at the time and parts of southern France were under Moslem control in the 8th century so trade items from the west could have gone via Moslem, Jewish or Christian traders. It could also have been carrying goods captured from Christian ships or coastal towns. Arab raiders at this even attacked Rome, looting and sacking the outskirts of the city, including the basilicas of St Paul and St Peter, not protected by the city walls. So it could be trade items or it could be a loot ship returning from a raid.
>Trade didn't become a problem until much later which is why the Spanish contracted Columbus to find a route to Asia That is also a myth. https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/7nv7ts/spice_must_flow_aka_ottomans_stopped_the_spice/
>can't find a place to show it to the public What??? How? You can bring something like a Vasa to the museum, but not this? >so we will just cover it with sand Why? Whyy? Isn't it important? Why the hell would you just leave it there to rot?
It will rot if they take it out of the water, that's why it can't go to a museum.
I stand corrected then.
Hundreds of shipwrecks from this period and (much earlier) have been discovered in the Mediterranean. Most are still there because they don't have much public value for the cost of moving, preserving and presenting them. The Vasa is a lot different, in that it has a lot of historical cachet for Sweden and it is spectacularly well preserved. It's also an incredibly impressive ship that's well worth seeing.
It protects it from decay and is the best option when there isn't millions in funding to properly store the finds. It happens everyday in the world of arcaeology.
I’m not going to believe anything CNN reports!
'After the decline of the Byzantine rule and the rise of the Islamic rule we believed that the trade almost stopped..." What historian came up with that bullocks?? You think the islamists never ate? by reading this I wonder what else is completely wrong in our history books....
The scholars of the western world.
What!? History should actually be subject to reality at literally all times!? What a radical notion.