Megan G. Hills (CNN) reports on the treasures of the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas, which sank in 1656 near the Bahamas. Items discovered on the shipwreck will be permanently housed at the Bahamas Maritime Museum, which opens August 8 in Freeport, Bahamas.
Stories of buried treasure and ancient shipwrecks have fascinated for centuries, from pirate tales to Hollywood blockbusters. However, for a team of explorers, the legend became reality when they discovered a range of artefacts from a sunken 350-year-old Spanish galleon – including coins, gems and precious jewels that once belonged to sea knights.
The Nuestra Señora de las Maravillas (or Our Lady of Wonders) sank in 1656 after colliding with another boat from her fleet and crashing into a coral reef near the Bahamas. The ship was carrying a cargo of treasure, some of which was reserved as royal tribute for King Philip IV, from Cuba to Seville, Spain. The 891-ton ship contained more cargo than usual, having also been loaded with treasure taken from another ship that had sunk two years earlier.
There have already been several successful attempts to retrieve the ship’s cargo, with almost 3.5 million items recovered between 1650 and 1990, according to shipwreck specialist Allen Exploration, which conducted a two-year expedition from 2020.
But the latest discoveries, which will go on display this month at the new Maritime Museum of the Bahamas, offer new insight into life aboard the ship. Working with local divers, archaeologists and other experts, researchers are also in the process of “reconstructing the mystery of how the ship was wrecked and broken up,” project marine archaeologist James Sinclair said in a news release.
Using remote sensing technology such as sonar and magnetometers, Allen Exploration traced “a long and winding trail of debris finds” scattered across a 13-kilometer stretch of the ocean floor, founder Carl Allen added in a statement.
Among the discoveries was a 1.76 meter long gold filigree chain and several jeweled pendants that once belonged to knights of the Order of Santiago, a centuries-old religious and military order. One of the gold pendants contains a large oval Colombian emerald and a dozen smaller emeralds, which experts believe may represent the 12 apostles, along with the Cross of St. James. Three other knight pendants were also discovered, including one shaped to look like a golden shell.
“When we brought in the oval emerald and gold pendant, my breath caught in my throat,” Allen said, adding: “How these little pendants survived in these rough waters and how we were able to find them is the wonder of the Wonders. .
Other artifacts found shed light on daily life in Maravillas, which sailed during the “Spanish Golden Age.” [sic] including Chinese porcelain and olive jars as well as a silver sword hilt. Some of the galleon’s valuable contents may also have been smuggled in for the purpose of “illegally greasing the palms of Spanish merchants and officials,” Allen said.
The items discovered by Allen’s team will be permanently housed at the Bahamas Maritime Museum, which opens Aug. 8 in the Caribbean nation’s second-largest city, Freeport.
And Sinclair believes there may still be more discoveries to be made.
“The ship may have disappeared from salvage and past hurricanes … But we’re convinced there’s more to the story there,” he said.
For the original article, see https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/maravillas-bahamas-shipwreck-treasure-scn/index.html
