This pioneering move of "Nanhai No. 1" marks that China's underwater archaeology has been at the forefront of the world

On April 22, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage issued the "14th Five-Year Plan for Archaeological Work", proposing to "implement the underwater cultural heritage survey of the Yellow Sea, Bohai Sea, East China Sea and South China Sea, and further sort out and clarify the foundation of archaeological resources on the mainland". With the advent of major archaeological discoveries such as "Nanhai No. 1" and "Dandong No. 1", underwater archaeology has gradually entered the public eye.

"For a long time, people have been accustomed to discussing the process of world civilization from a land perspective. In fact, water accounts for 71% of our blue planet, and the ocean also contains a lot of cultural heritage. Recently, in an online lecture in the Department of History of Fudan University, Wei Jun, a second-level researcher of the Department of Cultural Relics and Museology of Fudan University, talked about the shipwreck of Gridoa and the "Yangtze River Estuary No. 2" to unveil the mysterious world under the vast water body for the audience.

Another side of ancient civilization

Underwater archaeology generally refers to the practice of archaeology carried out in the underwater environment, including archaeological surveys and excavations carried out in the oceans, lakes, rivers, swamps, natural wells, as wells as in reservoirs, canals and other artificial water bodies.

"Looking back at history, the time of human contact with the ocean and water body is relatively long, at least a process of tens of thousands of years. In the meantime, a large number of human activities remained in the oceans or land bodies of water. Wei Jun introduced that in 1960, archaeologists completed the first scientific underwater archaeological excavation in the Gridoa Shipwreck Archaeological Project in Turkey, inventing underwater photography splicing technology, air-lifting mud pumping equipment, underwater mapping technology, etc., marking the birth of modern underwater archaeology. For more than half a century, this emerging branch of archaeology has borne fruit in different waters around the world.

Wei Jun introduced that according to the relationship between the remains and human behavior, the underwater archaeological objects are divided into two categories, namely the remains related to human wading behavior and unrelated. Human wading behavior, mainly including commercial activities, wars, sacrifice activities, fishing, etc., the resulting shipwrecks, cargo, war remnants and sacrifices, etc., have become important objects of underwater archaeology. In addition, there are some remains unrelated to human wading activities, mainly due to land and sea changes or other reasons that have sunk underwater, such as the site of the Xiqiao Mountain Quarry in Foshan City, Guangdong Province.

Marine or terrestrial bodies of water are ideal for the preservation of human remains. Wei Jun pointed out that in a study of the preservation of cultural relics in the terrestrial and wetland environments in Europe, in addition to stones and flintstones, almost all other materials are better preserved in the water environment than in the terrestrial environment. This is related to water depth, water oxygen content, and the underwater environment is less affected by human activities. Thanks to this feature, underwater artifacts can provide us with more valuable information for our study and interpretation of ancient societies. The artifacts of humanity that are sealed in the underwater world allow us to understand another aspect of ancient civilization.

The pioneering work of China's underwater archaeology community in the world

"In land archaeology, the method of 'Luoyang shovel drilling' is often used, and tools such as shovels and shovels can also be used to carry out archaeological excavations and clean up the surface of the soil and accumulation. Underwater, things are different. ”

Wei Jun introduced that due to the particularity of the water environment, underwater archaeology has developed some unique archaeological surveys and excavation methods.

In terms of survey and exploration methods, artificial surveys are more limited by the aquatic environment. "It has been found that ancient shipwrecks often had metal equipment, appliances or parts that reacted to metal detectors. With the Metal Detector, we can easily detect underwater conditions covered by sediment on the seabed. "Therefore, remote sensing detection technology has become the most commonly used method of modern underwater archaeology, including acoustic detection, geophysical exploration, etc., it can quickly collect a large amount of information, without being close to the target, wider coverage, lower requirements for the environment and other factors."

In terms of underwater excavation methods, there are currently three representative excavation methods, namely original site excavation, cofferdam excavation and relocation excavation.

Site excavation, i.e. on-site excavation of underwater sites using underwater archaeological techniques and equipment, is the most common method of underwater excavation. Cofferdam excavation, that is, for sites located in shallow water environments near the shore, the cofferdam is used to isolate the water body, extract or drain the accumulated water in the cofferdam, and change underwater archaeology into a special working method for land excavation. Relocation excavation refers to the relocation of the underwater site as a whole to the artificially controlled environment through underwater engineering technology when the environment where the site is located does not have the conditions for archaeological excavation. "The mainland's 'Nanhai No. 1' shipwreck archaeology project and the ongoing 'Yangtze River Estuary No. 2' shipwreck archaeological project fall into this category."

Wei Jun introduced that the sinking water depth of the "Nanhai No. 1" shipwreck is 24 meters, and the waters in the South China Sea are affected by typhoons for a long time every year, and if the original site excavation is taken, the annual operation time is very short. Therefore, archaeologists creatively proposed the way of "overall salvage", the most basic idea is to cut the shipwreck as a whole, package it as a whole, wrap it in a "big box", and then lift it out of the water as a whole and transport it to the museum with a controllable environment for excavation.

"The overall salvage of 'Nanhai No.1' is a pioneering undertaking in the world by China's underwater archaeology community and a vivid case of migratory conservation. It marks that China is already at the forefront of the world in the field of underwater archaeology and underwater heritage protection. The "Yangtze River Estuary No. 2" shipwreck archaeology project, which is currently being implemented, has further achieved key technological breakthroughs and achievements in the environment of zero visibility, providing new methods and opening up new ideas for underwater archaeological research in complex muddy waters along the estuary coast around the world.

"In the future, underwater archaeology will make more use of machines to improve work efficiency and reduce the danger of underwater operations." How to design targeted investigation and excavation equipment and continuously improve technical capabilities in view of the particularity of underwater archaeology will be an aspect of breakthrough in the future. Wei Jun said.

This lecture was hosted by the Student Union of the Department of History of Fudan University and is one of the series of activities of the "Jian Xing" CHT People's Day.

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