The Uluburun Shipwreck: Late Bronze-Age International Trade
- Date
- c. 1320–1300 BCE
- Category
- Economy & trade
- Region
- Mediterranean (off Anatolia, Turkey)
- Era
- Ancient Civilizations
- Significance
A merchant ship that sank off Uluburun, near Kas on the southern coast of Anatolia (modern Turkey), around 1320–1300 BCE preserved the richest assemblage of Late Bronze-Age trade goods ever recovered.
Discovered in 1982 and excavated by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology under George Bass over eleven seasons (1984–1994), the cargo included roughly ten tons of Cypriot copper ingots and about a ton of tin — the makings of bronze — together with Canaanite glass ingots, ebony from Africa, ivory, terebinth resin, faience, Mycenaean and Cypriot pottery, ostrich eggshells, and luxury items such as a gold scarab of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti. Goods originated from at least seven cultures spanning the Aegean, Egypt, Cyprus, the Levant, Anatolia and beyond. The wreck offers a vivid snapshot of the interconnected, palace-centred exchange system that bound the Late Bronze-Age Mediterranean together — and that would collapse within little more than a century.
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Empires active in c. 1320–1300 BCE
- New Kingdom of Egypt1550 BCE – 1077 BCE
- Shang Dynasty1600 BCE – 1046 BCE
- Hittite Empire1650 BCE – 1178 BCE
- Mitanni1500 BCE – 1300 BCE
- Elamite Kingdom2700 BCE – 539 BCE
Related economy & trade events
- Hatshepsut's expedition to the Land of Puntc. 1469 BCE
- Old Assyrian trade network and the karum of Kaneshc. 1950–1750 BCE
- Meluhha: Indus Trade with Akkadian Mesopotamiac. 2400-2300 BCE
- Standardised Binary Weights System of the Indusc. 2600 BCE
- Invention of Standardised Coinage in Lydia (the Lydian Stater)c. 630 BCE
- Laurion silver strike funds the Athenian fleet483 BC
Further reading
The wider story
The Silk Roads: A New History of the World
Best-selling world history told through the trade routes that moved goods, faiths and ideas.
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