Serce Limant: An Eleventh-Century Shipwreck, vol. 1: The Ship and Its Anchorage, Crew, and Passengers.

• Author: Schultz, Warren C.
• Position: Book review

Serce Limant: An Eleventh-Century Shipwreck, vol. 1: The Ship and Its Anchorage, Crew, and Passengers. Edited by GEORGE F. BASS. SHEILA MATTHEWS, J. RICHARD STEEFY, and FREDERICK H. VAN DOORNINCK, JR. Ed Rachal Foundation Nautical Archaeology Series. College Station, Texas: TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2004. Pp. xvii + 558. $125.

"And that was all of it: a little merchant vessel that was full and flat and simply built" (p. 154). Such is J. Richard Steffy's summation of the small cargo vessel that sank off the coast of southwestern Turkey around 1025 C.E. Thanks to several tons of cullet recovered from the sunken site, it is now commonly referred to as the glass wreck. Whatever it is called, the resting place of this simple ship has revealed a wealth of information about eleventh-century commerce and daily life. The Institute of Nautical Archaeology has spent years excavating, preserving, and ultimately exhibiting (at the Museum in Bodrum, Turkey) the materials they removed from the seabed at Serce Limani (Sparrow harbor), and this book is the first of several planned volumes detailing and contextualizing their findings.

After a preface and brief introduction, volume one is structured in two main parts, each consisting of three sections. Part I, "The Ship, the Site and the Excavation," contains the following sections: "The History of Serce Limani (chs. 2-4); "Discovery, Excavation, and Conservation (ch. 5); and "The Ship: Hull, Rigging, Anchors, and Ballast" (chs. 6-14). Part II, "Possessions and Victuals," contains these three sections: "Probable Personal Possessions of Crew and Passengers, excluding Ceramic Wares and Commercial Equipment" (chs. 15-24); "Victuals" (chs. 25-26); and the appendices. As is stated in the preface, this book is the beginning of the process of documenting the site. Future volumes will develop the mercantile aspects of the wreck (p. xii).

As the initial chapters point out, this shipwreck presented both challenges and opportunities to those excavating it. The challenges are clearly defined in the early pages; it is the opportunities that are worthy of highlighting in this review. As Bass indicates, everything brought on this ship was brought for a reason. Whether related to the sailing of the ship (such as the ballast or the rigging), the business of the ship (the cargo), or the belongings, professional or personal, of the crew and any passengers, there was a reason for each object. One of the goals of this volume is...