Wednesday 20 July 2016

1545 and all that

Yesterday was an anniversary of the sinking of the Mary Rose, flagship of the English monarch Henry the Eighth in 1545.



In a manouvre in battle against the French fleet the huge and heavily armed warship, actually in His Majesty's Service since 1511,  foundered as water poured in through the lower gun ports.

The vessel sank rapidly with the death of the vast majority of the 500 crew and in the mud of the Solent seabed a lasting memorial was laid to rest or at least for around 425 years.

In a prolonged period of salvage and scientific restoration since the 1970's some 19,000 artefacts have been recovered and where possible restored. The ship was the equivalent of a small town in its range of services and the specialities of those on board from the fighting crew to cooks, quartermasters, surgeons, joiners, fitters and engineers.



The following is a selection of some of the items, mundane and domestic, artistic and precious, personal and unique, utilitarian and military, poignant and melancholy, anachronistic or still applicable to our modern lifestyles.

Boatswains Whistle on lanyard
Wood and leather bellows
Oak, poplar and pine tankard, pitch lined
Sandglasses
Leather thigh boots
Backgammon set
Hand fishing reel
Pewter Chamberpot
Swivel Guns
Quill nibs
Wooden trencher plates
Pewter flasks and flagons
Lantern in poplar wood
Candleholder and copper snuffer
Yew Longbows
Tally sticks
Folding table stand
Calfskin book cover
Cowhorn inkpot
Fiddle in cattleskin box
Heavy cannon
Octagonal beech balance set
Nit combs
Priming wires
Singlehanded navigation dividers
Skeletal traces of rats
Pocket sundial
Spile
Pepper Mill
Pomander in leather scabbard
Bobbins
Pewter and wooden spoons
Woollen hat
Linen bandage roll in resin and pitch
Anti-boarding nets
Shoes
Manicure set
Wedding and signet rings
Bone figurine
Scogger sleeve
Cowrie Shell
Swords and daggers
Elm wood mallet
Pewter syringe
Copper alloy cauldron
Elm ladle
Rough and smooth stone cannon shot
Cast bronze ships bell
Linstocks
Leather mittens
Sword hanger
Piston whistle
Pendant drop
Thimbles
Beef bones
Chain mail
Leather tool holder
Paternoster
Powder horn lids
Wicker flask
Pewter alloy flasks
Carpenters brace and bit
Chalk reel
Complete skeleton of small dog (thought to have been trapped in a cabin below decks at the sinking)




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