OLDER THAN THE GREAT PYRAMID’S FINAL STONE: World’s Oldest Shipwreck Found Off Turkey, With Its Cargo Still Inside

Archaeologists say they have found the world’s oldest shipwreck, lying just 30 metres under the sea off Kekova Island in Antalya, Turkey. They date it to between 4,400 and 4,700 years ago, the Early Bronze Age, around the time the Great Pyramid of Giza was being built.

The discovery was reported by the BBC and Nature’s daily briefing this week.

What the divers found

The ship’s wooden hull has not survived. What remains is its cargo and equipment, scattered down an underwater slope:

• three large stone anchors, because ships carried spares on long voyages;
• more than 30 large ceramic storage jars, known as amphorae.

The team estimates the vessel was about 10 metres long and worked as a trading ship crossing the Mediterranean.

How do you date a ship with no wood?

Without wood, radiocarbon dating was not possible. Instead, the archaeologists studied the shape of the jars. The Kekova amphorae have two handles, a ridge in the middle and a flat base, a style that matches jars from Egypt and the Middle East known to be 4,400 to 4,700 years old.

“Comparing the decoration techniques… we can definitely say our wreck is Early Bronze Age,” said expedition leader Prof Hakan Öniz of Akdeniz University.

“I looked inside and nearly fainted”

Some jars were still intact. Dr Karin Sowada of Macquarie University found a thick, glossy residue inside them. “I looked inside and nearly fainted. I could not believe how much [residue] was visible,” she told the BBC. It could be olive oil, wine or tree resin. Tests are under way.

Where was it going?

The team believes the ship sailed from the eastern Mediterranean coast, carrying goods either to Troy, in north-western Turkey, or to the Minoans on Crete. The waters around Kekova are known for strong currents and winds, and hundreds of wrecks lie there.

A new record

The previous record holder was a wreck off the Greek island of Dokos, dated to about 4,200 years ago. The recovered objects are due to go on display at the new Mediterranean Underwater Archaeology Museum in Antalya.

“We are the first humans who [have] touched these objects after 5,000 years,” Öniz said. More discoveries in our Science section.

Source: BBC News, “World’s oldest shipwreck found off coast of Turkey”; Nature Briefing, 14 October 2026.

Featured image: Mazarron I (cropped) by santiago lopez-pastor from España, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons.