Topics Related to Queen Anne's Revenge
After 300 years on the sea bed, the condition of objects is highly variable. When objects are in very good condition it’s easy to tell what they are made of, but when things have rusted, rotted, and decayed away that gets a lot harder. With extremely damaged objects conservators run into one fundamental problem: how do you fix something if you don’t know what it’s made of?
The number one question I get asked at the NCMM Demo Lab in Beaufort, NC is undoubtedly, "So…where’s Blackbeard’s gold?" This is a fair question given that at some point prior to its grounding in June of 1718,
On November 17, 1717*, La Concorde encountered an unruly band of pirates and quickly fell into the hands of the fearsome Blackbeard.
After resting on the ocean floor for 300 years, it is only natural that the artifacts would become salty. The salt in seawater is soluble (dissolved in a liquid, such as water) which allows it to enter most of the materials found on the site. Salt enters the artifact through the process of osmosis; a concentrated solution (seawater) goes through a membrane (the surface of the artifact) to a less concentrated solution (inside the artifact) to balance the amount of salt on both sides.
Several sets of brass weights were recovered from underwater excavation of the Queen Anne’s Revenge Shipwreck. Some were flat or disc weights in round and square shapes.
La Concorde, later Queen Anne’s Revenge was what is known as a square-rigged vessel, meaning the primary sails used to propel the vessel were set perpendicular to the keel of the vessel. A vessel with this type of rig would place many unique demands on the crew, both on deck and above, including furling (rolling up) sails at great heights in the air and hauling on lines with incredible force on deck.
Not only do we raise large, immediately recognizable objects from QAR such as cannons and anchors, but we are also constantly on the search for minute remnants of shipboard life.
Although buttons have been present in the archaeological record as decorative clothing elements as early as 2000 BC in the Indus Valley region, the first mention of the buttonhole was not until the 13th centu
On September 28, 1717*, La Concorde left Ouidah on the west coast of Africa with 516 enslaved men, women, and children, and 14 ounces of gold dust.
In following along on our adventures in conservation, you may have learned a new term often heard in the lab: concretion. As described in previous entries, concretions can contain a wealth of artifacts, made of many different materials. Corrosion is the driving force behind the development of concretion on iron and the subsequent envelopment of other artifacts nearby. We find a lot of iron on Queen Anne’s Revenge, thus a lot of corrosion, and in turn, a LOT of concretion.