The Lost Forest
Page 43
Chapter 43
UNDERSEA ARCHAEOLOGY
Ennis had engaged Robert Guigulion, a French expatriate specialist, highly recommended by the Musée Guimet, to undertake the excavation of the wreck. Guigulion had worked from a base in Malacca in Peninsular Malaysia for many years as an undersea explorer, through a company that he and his wife Gisele owned, South China Sea Exploration Sdn Bhd. They had discovered several ancient cargo vessels and had excavated a number of sites using established archaeology methods, recovering cargoes of antique pottery, Chinese porcelain and pottery, and other artefacts.
Guigulion’s work had been funded by museums and private collections, especially those in Stuttgart and Amsterdam who were specialised in wreck disposals. His company, incorporated in Malaysia, had been nominated as exclusive subcontractor to Archaeological Research and Exploration Inc., and immediately accepted by the Brunei Museum.
The operating costs worked out a several thousands dollars a day, and the sooner the work was completed the more profitable the operation. Exactly how long it would take was difficult to fix with precision as weather conditions were an important factor. When the weather turned stormy the surface conditions made raising the cargo difficult with the risk of breakage when loading the padded baskets to the barge.
Under normal conditions two periods were favourable for diving in the South China Sea, May and September, but because of the shallow waters covering the wreck in a protected bay working conditions on the site were good.
After surveying the site, a reference grid consisting of metal frames was set up on the seabed that allowed the divers to plot the location of each artefact before it was removed, this served as an archaeological record. A laboratory and workshop was set up not far from the beach, where specialists worked recording data and storing the objects recovered from the wreck, each item was inventoried and restored to avoid deterioration in the air after hundreds of years beneath the waves.
After centuries of submersion in the sea salt penetrated deep inside glaze cracks and had to be removed as it damaged the surface. The de-salination process was carried out by soaking the ceramics in fresh water over a period of time, monitoring the salinity levels, until the accumulated salt was removed. Any calcareous growth was first carefully removed by hand and then washed in a weak hydrochloric acid then rinsed with distilled water.
Several soldiers were posted by the prefabricated building that had been erected not far from the beach, they guarded the valuable cargo around the clock to avoid pilfering or worse and keep out unwelcome visitors, though apart from the curious most visitors were from the ministry or the museum to inspect the objects recovered.
Whilst the larger part of the objects recovered were of a relatively average quality a sufficiently large part of the cargo was of a much greater quality, some in almost perfect condition, the kind that museums and collectors would be prepared to pay high prices. Whilst there were many large storage jars, there was also a satisfying quantity of fine decorative objects and dining ware.
All of the ceramics were of Chinese origin. They included different types of Yixing ware, blue-and-white porcelain from the famous Jingdezhen kilns in Jiangxi, and simpler porcelain from the Dehua kilns in Fujian province.
There was also a number of large brown-glazed stoneware jars used to store smaller objects from the region of Suzhou, and it was possible that these storage jars were made in the same area. There were also teapots, covered boxes, glazed bowls and water pots some of which were stored inside the large jars, the museums experts suggested these could been loaded onto the junk in the Chinese port of Hangzhou.
The blue-and-white porcelain was found in separate cargo holds, and is likely to have been taken on board at the same time. There was also a smaller quantity of blanc de chine ware probably from the port of Quanzhou. The brown-glazed basins, in nested sets of three or four, probably from Guangdong Province, the junk’s last port of call in China.
The wreck and its cargo were not something unique, some thirty ships had already been excavated in the region by different groups and Guigulion estimated that there were more to be discovered.
Brunei was a signatory of the UN International Convention of the Law of the Sea, according to which, countries own the area within twelve nautical miles from their shoreline, and a further zone of two hundred miles being an Exclusive Economic Zone, giving the countries with coast lines the rights to fishing and mineral deposits, but no rights to archaeological objects. In the case of the Brunei wreck it lay well within the twelve nautical mile limit.
To Robert Guigulion shipwrecks and their cargoes were time capsules, and in the case of the Brunei wreck, the cargo of antique pottery and porcelain was laden with historical data. The design of the junk, its construction techniques and its cargo, were all valuable indicators to every day life, commerce and technology at the time it sunk.
Such information was vital to museums and collectors, whose displays could be backed up by scientific documentation and dating methods, cross reference to other undersea archaeological discoveries and comparison to stylistic and technical development in antique porcelain.
In the past wrecks had been looted by the finders without respect to scientific or archaeological needs. Times had changed and laws protected wrecks and the history they contain, although looting still continued in certain countries.
Since late in the nineteenth century the research of Asian ceramics had been pursued by a growing number of dedicated people, including historians, museum curators, field archaeologists, and competent amateurs.
A total of 40,000 objects were recovered from the wreck. The Tanjong Lumut junk had been sailing to Borneo when she sank in the late 16th early 17th century. Her commercial cargo was composed of ceramics and bronze goods from China.
The Malay Peninsula had separated two primary networks of sailing routes. To the west lay the Indian Ocean, with routes extending from the western coast of the Malay Peninsula to the shores of Africa, and to the east lay the South China Sea, with a network of routes connecting East and Southeast Asia. The region reaped benefits from its geographical position in several ways. It sold local produce to both networks and its ports offered shipping services, warehousing and accommodation, it established markets whilst its rulers taxed both ships and merchants. Ships that sailed the major long-distance routes, the maritime Silk Road, mingled with local and regional vessels.
The Malay Peninsula, known to Indians as the Golden Peninsula, offered a number of ports which became famous at various times over the centuries. The coast of northern Borneo was also important, particularly in the 15th century.
However, the first Eemperor of the Ming dynasty banned private overseas trade. This ban became effective in 1371 and lasted for about two centuries, although enforcement fluctuated, as smuggling prospered.
The ban undoubtedly affected trade networks in Southeast Asia. As the supply of Chinese goods decreased, producers and traders based in Southeast Asia became more filled the gap. The most acute shortage of Chinese goods was certainly during the Hongwu reign, when the official maritime trade superintendencies at Wenzhou, Quanzhou and Guangzhou were closed. Foreign goods reached the Chinese court only through the tributary system, in which foreign sovereigns sent gifts from their own lands and were rewarded with gifts from the Emperor. The maritime trade offices were reopened by the Emperor Yongle, who continued to ban commercial travel overseas pursuing a vigorous foreign policy with the expedition of great fleets under the famous admiral Zhenghe. The voyages of these treasure ships continued until 1433, and reached as far as Africa. The cost of these expeditions, and the response they provoked requiring lavish receptions for foreign emissaries, who arrived bearing gifts for the Emperor, proved a serious drain on the Chinese economy, and no doubt contributed to the renewal of isolationist policies.
The reduced Chinese trade with Southeast Asia during the rest of the 15th century was noted by the Portuguese writer Tome Pires, who mentions both the tri
butary system and the problems for Chinese wishing to travel overseas:
It is thought that certain Chinese entrepreneurs, rather than submitting to imperial orders, moved to bases in Southeast Asia, and others continued to supply smuggled goods from China.