One of the oldest ghost ships in Sweden has emerged in a place it should not have appeared, leaving scientists puzzled.
According to PHYS, scientists have employed the “tree-ring dating” technique, which involves tracing the tree rings of the wooden planks that make up the ship, not to determine the age of the tree, but to find out when the trees were cut down and used for shipbuilding.
A scientist diving to the site of the ghost ship – (Photo: University of Gothenburg).
This analysis allows scientists to observe subtle signs indicating how the tree rings were formed under specific climatic conditions and the natural impacts they endured. By comparing this data with known environmental information from that time, researchers can ascertain when the tree was felled.
The results indicate that the oak planks were cut down between 1233 and 1240 AD, meaning that the ship is nearly 800 years old. It is a cog ship, a design that was famous in Europe at that time. The remaining parts suggest that the ship, when intact, was up to 20 meters long.
This wood has also been identified as oak from the forests of northwestern Germany, which is quite far from the fishing village on the western coast of Sweden – near Dyngö Island – where the ship was discovered.
Ancient cog ship – (Photo: VollwertBIT).
According to researchers from the University of Gothenburg (Sweden), there are three possible reasons for the ship’s unusual distance from its origin: it was attacked by pirates, caught fire due to an accident while seeking rescue, or it was involved in a war.
The exact cause of the shipwreck has not been comprehensively determined, but the remaining traces indicate that the ship was on fire before it became a ghost ship, hidden beneath the sea, as reported by Ancient Origins.
