Artefacts from the Sabana’s Site: Attempt to Identify a Seventeenth-Century Shipwreck in Venezuela

Abstract

The coast of Venezuela plays an important role in the history of colonial occupation, such as pearls exploitation, slavery, settlement and maritime trade, since the beginning of the sixteenth century. The natural morphology of the coast was conducive to the establishment of natural ports. In 2007, a pile of cannons was found by a fisherman in the town of La Sabana to the south-east of the main port of La Guaira. The site presents a group of bronze cannons dated from the second half of the sixteenth to the first half of the seventeenth century; there are also iron cannons. Five guns were extracted illegally and were recovered by the Institute of Cultural Heritage to avoid illegal trade, where they have been restored and preserved. The bronze artillery presents decorated elements which suggest that they were made by at least three different masters from Portugal, Belgium and Germany. The earliest one dates back to 1553 and belongs to a series of pieces founded by masters Remigy de Halut. The recovery of the cannons promoted underwater prospections carried out between 2010 and 2011 in risky areas of looting. The methodology used was based on visual surveys and non-invasive in situ treatment. The surveyed area is located in shallow waters between 2 and 10 m depth. The purpose was the observation of diagnostic elements in order to determine a chronology of the remains. Most of the archaeological materials found are related to an Atlantic ship from the modern period.