Roxanna M. Brown History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia Roxanna M. Brown History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia he Belitung wreck is a recent addition to of Jiangxi province. Thus the eyes of scholars of 1 Ayers 1978; Keith 1979, 1980. Tthe large, and continuously growing, corpus Chinese art from all over the world immediately 2 Liu Xinyuan 1998 and 1999. of maritime archaeological sites discovered in turned to Korea when a shipwreck with a cargo Southeast Asia (cf. fig. 1). This spate of under- of Chinese trade ceramics was surveyed and par- water exploration largely began three decades tially excavated in 1976.1 Coins retrieved from ago in the mid 1970s and continues unabated. the site suggested that the ship sailed in the early Since there is no central repository for informa- fourteenth century, yet the extensive ceramic tion on the various discoveries, and few ships cargo did not include blue-and-white. As a result are as well documented as the Belitung wreck, of the Sinan wreck finds, scholars concluded that it is worthwhile to review the finds in general. Jingdezhen blue-and-white was not exported The sorts of primary data offered by underwa- before about 1325. This conclusion is supported ter archaeology in Southeast Asia are certain to by recent research at Jingdezhen itself. Chinese have an impact on a variety of ongoing historical archaeologists now say that blue-and-white from debates. These debates involve questions about Jingdezhen was first exported in 1328.2 Evidence changes in shipbuilding techniques and routes from the land thus validates and corroborates over time, ship sizes, and the extent and content evidence from the sea. of trade in Asia. The wrecks offer invaluable data relevant to cycles of commerce, and they may A date for the earliest export of blue-and-white help answer questions about the spread of reli- from Jingdezhen is only one aspect of the history gions. Shipwreck cargoes also provide a bounti- of cobalt use in Asia. Cobalt produced the blue ful means to hone a more definitive chronology glaze seen on many Tang dynasty burial wares, of trade ceramics. Land sites rarely yield dates for but that glaze is quite different from the glazes ceramics so precise as potentially possible from of Jingdezhen. The colourful Tang dynasty glazes shipwrecks. Indeed, it is analysis of shipwreck are low-temperature lead glazes. The glazes of cargoes that is beginning to offer chronologies Jingdezhen are high-temperature ash glazes. that can be applied to land sites. The colourful Tang ceramics are earthenware, while underglaze blue decoration at Jingdezhen One of the most intriguing and enduring ques- is applied to high-fired stoneware and porcelain. tions in Chinese ceramics concerns the date and Following decades of claims by a few ardent circumstances that led to the introduction of Chinese collectors that there were underglaze blue-and-white ceramics at the Jingdezhen kilns blue wares in the Song dynasty, archaeologists 42 History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia eventually did find evidence for pre-Jingdezhen Champa (a former kingdom located in central blue-and-white. In fact, the finds are also pre- Vietnam) and Thailand.5 Like the Sinan wreck, 3 The archaeological data on pre-fourteenth-century blue-and- Song dynasty. Very old blue-and-white sherds it also did not yield Chinese blue-and-white white in China is reviewed by were discovered first in 1975 and then in the wares, but it represents a time in the fifteenth Rita Tan in Gotuaco et al. 1997, xiii–xv. 1980s at Yangzhou, Jiangsu province, and they century when blue-and-white was not exported 4 The tie between ninth- and were assigned to the ninth century when the to Southeast Asia. The Thai ceramics, moreover, fourteenth-century Chinese port of Yangzhou was frequented by Arabs and came from three different production centres. blue-and-white may have to do with customer preference. Blue Persians. They are believed to have been made at For the first time here was evidence that these is a popular colour in the Middle the Gongxian kilns, Henan.3 Again, finds from three centres were all active at the same time. The East. the sea corroborate evidence on land, for the long held theory that the Sukhothai kilns closed 5 The Ko Khram is the subject of numerous articles; see, for cargo of the Belitung wreck offers three pristine, when the Sawankhalok kilns opened had to be instance, Brown 1975–76, Howitz unbroken examples of Tang dynasty blue-and- discarded. In addition to continuous re-assess- 1977, Green 1981, Rooney 1981, Green and Harper 1987. white that resemble the finds from Yangzhou and ments of this vessel and its cargo, the discovery 6 The Pontian boat is featured Gongxian (nos 107–109). and documentation of the Ko Khram wreck can in articles by Evans (1927) and be used as a signpost for the beginnings of an Gibson-Hill (1952). Manguin (1996) refers to it as an example Mysteries remain of course. No connection has amazing series of shipwreck finds in Southeast of traditional early South- east Asian boat construction. yet been established between the ninth- and Asia. Only two sites were documented prior to Booth (1984) gives the results the fourteenth-century blue-and-white wares. 1974, and more than a hundred have been re- of radiocarbon dating on the boat as 293 +/-60. The finds are Whether blue-and-white was produced in the ported since then. An average four or five more also summarized in Brown and years between is unknown. The dishes aboard are discovered every year. Sjostrand 2002. the Belitung wreck revive these old questions 7 Sieveking et al. 1954. about the origins of blue-and-white and make The first of the two sites known prior to 1974 the discussions ever more interesting.4 involves a small vessel assigned to the third–fifth centuries found in the Pontian River, Malaysia. In 1974, shortly before the Sinan wreck was In addition to being the subject of the earliest first discovered by Korean fishermen, another report on an antique boat in Southeast Asia, the shipwreck, this one from the fifteenth century, Pontian vessel remains the oldest known vessel was discovered by fishermen in the Gulf of Thai- in Southeast Asia.6 The second site involves three land. Identified as the Ko Khram (or Sattahip) vessels of the eighteenth–nineteenth centuries wreck, it carried a surprising mixture of trade ce- that were discovered together at Johore Lama, ramics from southern China, northern Vietnam, Malaysia in the 1950s.7 History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia 43 BANGLADESH CHINA INDIA MYANMAR (BURMA) VIETNAM LAOS Hoi An THAILAND INDIAN OCEAN CAMBODIA Ko Kradat Samed Ngam Prasae Rayong Binh Thuan Phu Quoc II Ko Samui Vung Tau Phu Quoc/Vungtau Ca Mau SRI LANKA Singtai Longquan MALAYSIA Xuande Royal Nahai Nanyang Desaru Turiang SINGAPORE INDONESIA BELITUNG Maranei Intan Java Sea Wreck INDONES 44 History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia Bai Jiao I TAIWAN San Isidro PHILIPPINES Thitu Reef PACIFIC OCEAN BRUNEI MALAYSIA INDONESIA INDONESIA PAPUA-NEW GUINEA DONESIA Fig. 1 Shipwreck sites in the South China Sea (Map courtesy of ECAI Southeast Asia). History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia 45 History of Shipwreck Excavation in Southeast Asia Shipwreck sites have been located and at least academic community about whether the pieces 8 Christie’s 1984a, 1984b and partially investigated both in international actually came from a shipwreck or not. Thus 1985. waters and within the territorial waters of almost when the same entrepreneur, Michael Hatcher, 9 In a popular book for hopeful all the countries of Southeast Asia (cf. fig. 1). found a second shipwreck, the Dutch East local treasure hunters, Tony Wells’ Shipwrecks & Sunken Treasure in Sites in international waters are investigated by Indies Company’s Geldermalsen, the excavation Southeast Asia (1995, 38), for in- stance, the story is featured under private entrepreneurs who base their salvage was documented with reports and underwater the heading ‘The Geldermalsen’s rights on international laws of the sea. Sites in photography. The sale of Geldermalsen finds as Fabulous Nanking Cargo’. The ship, which was en route from territorial waters have been excavated by the rel- The Nanking Cargo at Christie’s Amsterdam in Canton, China, to the Nether- 9 lands, sank on 3 January 1752. evant national authorities alone or sometimes in 1985 is well remembered. The event fired the conjunction with archaeologists from abroad or imaginations of treasure hunters worldwide, it 10 Liu Benan 1995. together with private companies. Sometimes the is continually cited as an example of great riches 11 See Christie’s 1984a, 1984b, work of excavation is wholly contracted out to under the sea (even though no other shipwreck 1985, 1986, 1992, 1995 and 2004; Butterfields 2000; Nagel Auctions a private company, and sometimes the country cargo in Southeast Asia has brought as much 2000. simply issues an excavation permit to salvors for money) and Chinese authorities openly admit a fee. In Vietnam, the national salvage company that the Geldermalsen sale led directly to the is usually involved. In Thailand, the Underwater creation of the Research Laboratory of Under- Archae ology section of the Fine Arts Depart- water Archaeology at Beijing History Museum ment directs excavations. There is a wide range in 1987.10 Actually, relatively few cargoes from of possibilities. The extent of published docu- shipwrecks in Southeast Asia have made it to mentation of a wrecksite also varies consider- auction houses. Five ( Hatcher’s Ming wreck, the ably. Sometimes there is a full excavation report Geldermalsen, the Diana, the Vung Tau cargo, but more often either the archaeology or the data and Binh Thuan) have been sold by Christie’s, a recording (or both) is incomplete.