The story of the earliest medieval shipwreck goes on display at Poole Museum
The museum has re-opened after a £10 million regeneration project.
An English medieval shipwreck is the subject of a display at Poole Museum, which is now open to the public for the first time after a seven-year, £10 million heritage-led regeneration project.
Museum visitors can learn about how the 13th Century old shipwreck was first discovered by local charter boat skipper Trevor Small of Rocket Charters in Poole Bay on the edge of the Swash Channel, and how Maritime Archaeologists from Bournemouth University helped to uncover its history.
Inside the ship, several Purbeck stone mortars were found. These large stones were used in mills to grind grains into flour. Two Purbeck marble gravestone slabs were also discovered in the wreck in remarkably good condition. These items are now on display at Poole Museum in a new exhibition called the ‘Mortar Wreck’ exhibition.
The university’s Maritime Archaeologist, Tom Cousins, who led the project and organised multiple dives to the wreck site to raise the contents of the ship to the surface said: “Bournemouth University is in a unique position situated next to one of the oldest harbours and maritime trading routes in the UK. We are fortunate to be able to discover wrecks as old as the medieval Mortar Wreck. Seeing the cargo and items that on display in Poole Museum is a great testament to the last twenty years' work by the Maritime Archaeology Department at BU.”
Joe Raine, Collections Officer at Poole Museum said: "We’re really lucky to have a great collaboration with Bournemouth University here at Poole Museum in that we are the receiver for a lot of the artefacts that they bring up from the wrecks they find. When we first heard about the discovery of the Mortar Wreck we were just so excited to play our part in the whole story which is to put the items on display to members of the public who may know nothing about the trade in Purbeck stone, or medieval seafaring, and we can tell that story.”