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Belitung shipwreck

An Arab dhow that sank around 830 AD off Belitung Island, Indonesia, on its way home from China. It carried the largest single collection of Tang dynasty objects ever found outside China, some 60,000 items, and offers new insight into the sea trade between China and the Middle East. Its fast, commercially funded excavation is still argued over.

Dated events and their evidence

• 826 CE mainstream
  one Changsha bowl in the cargo is inscribed with a date in the second year of the Baoli reign, 826 AD, later confirmed by radiocarbon dating of star anise from the wreck source
• 830 CE mainstream
  around 830 AD the dhow, its outward voyage from Arabia to China done, sinks on the way back about 1.6 km off Belitung, south of the usual trade route source
• 1998 CE mainstream
  local fishermen find the wreck 17 m deep in the Gelasa Strait; Tilman Walterfang's Seabed Explorations excavates it in 1998-1999 source
• 2005 CE mainstream
  the Sentosa Leisure Group and the Government of Singapore buy the cargo for about 32 million US dollars source
• 2011 CE mainstream
  after archaeologists object that the excavation was commercial and too fast, the Smithsonian postpones its planned US premiere of the cargo source

Where

2.7500° S, 107.6100° E

The point is Wikipedia's position for the wreck, about 1.6 km off the north-west coast of Belitung Island.

Sources

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belitung_shipwreck
• https://doi.org/10.1080/00438240120048662

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