Lisbon’s discreet warehouse where national nautical treasures are recovered
Anyone passing by the gate at number 5 of Rua da Manutenção, in Xabregas, is far from imagining that since August those old tobacco warehouses have housed thousands of marine archaeological treasures that are in charge of the National Center for Nautical and Underwater Archeology (CNANS), a body supervised by the Ministry of Culture. “The National Center for Nautical and Underwater Archeology is a center that was founded in 1997 whose mission is to deal with all matters that directly affect underwater and nautical archeology in Portugal. Underwater is easy to understand, it’s everything that happens underwater , be it the sea, be it a river, be it a lake. And nautical also because there is a set of spoilage elements that relate to nautical and that are found in contexts that are not necessarily underwater. years, for example, on the riverfront of Lisbon. The missions of the center are to fight for the safeguard and protection of all these assets and the management of these assets”, explains José António Gonçalves, coordinator of CNANS, to DN.
About 80% of this new space is dedicated to the laboratory and only 20% to the administrative part. The mission of the National Center for Nautical and Underwater Archeology is not to incorporate pieces into its collection, but rather to study and inventory pieces, as well as to carry out the treatment and conservation of archaeological pieces that will then be delivered to the National Archeology Museum, local museums or even even to private institutions.
A guided tour of the CNANS facilities allows you to see the scale of the work of the center’s three conservators and seven archaeologists. The collection of this center has around 20 thousand inventory entries, with small and large pieces, such as ceramic fragments, swords, cannons and shipwrecks.
The place where it all starts, after the parts arrive at CNANS and are cleaned, is a preventive immersion tank unit. A huge room full of tanks, with dozens of submerged pieces. “The most recent pieces in this area are from last year, which are pieces of wood from a boat that was discovered by the natural opening of the Lagoa de Melides. Besides, we have everything, from the north to the south of the country, many things from Aveiro , the estuary also has a series of wrecks, many of these tanks also have an Arade boat, which is the large 19th century Arade 1, which was fully excavated and studied around 2004. We have wood from Praça do Municipality of Lisbon, other things from Lisbon from Praça D. Luís”, shows the coordinator of CNANS.
The crown jewels in this room are in the so-called metal zone. “These six cannons are part of another set of recently classified National Treasures. They are the cannons of Ponta do Altar, in all the ten bronze cannons of Ponta do Altar were classified. Three of them are separated and exhibited in the Museum of Portimão, there are another one that is also treated, which we have in a box, and we have these six here that are awaiting treatment. They are already stabilized, it’s just a matter of cleaning it up”, says José António Gonçalves. “It is believed that it may have come from a boat in difficulties, we are talking about a 16th century boat, which in a stormy situation is having navigation difficulties, it must have sought shelter in the Arade estuary, but until it got there, to Going around Ponta do Altar, he must have dropped loads, dropped weight overboard to have more maneuverability, and at those heights you start with the heaviest, like cannons.”
Arade is a wreck zone
In a lateral area are the tanks where the parts are desalinated. The space isn’t as imposing as the previous room, but these small tanks also have little treasures buried in them. Like ceramics from Aveiro, a lantern from the Torvore, a Norwegian freighter that in 1917 was shot down and wrecked by a German submarine off Sagres, or pulleys from the French galleon Océano, defeated by an English fleet at the Battle of Lagos, eventually sinking already at Praia da Salema. José António Gonçalves takes the opportunity to recall that it was this military confrontation that gave rise to the Seven Years’ War and that the Océan is “the only visitable circuit in Portugal”.
“This Arade sword, which has already been X-rayed and has been exhibited at the Archeology Museum, came to the conclusion that it is possible that the iron blade is very damaged and that, taking out the compression, we are inflicting more damage and we will have difficulties in preserving it. The matter is not closed yet, but it will stay that way for now, “says the coordinator of CNAS, as he wields the sword. “It was found out of context, it was in a shipwreck on the Arade River, the Arade River is littered with shipwrecks, from the Roman period to modernity, and it did not have an associated shipwreck, so we do not know the context very well. something medieval. In the Arade there is always the ambition of one day finding traces of the Viking fleet that was defeated by the ancients, there was a fleet of Vikings that tried to conquer the city of Silves, a squadron came from Seville to help a defender of the city and there was a big battle that the Vikings lost and there is a desire to find Arade the remains of the battle, “says the conservative.
It is in the National Center for Nautical and Underwater Archeology that they are also like six canoes that were recently classified as a National Treasure. Two of them are submerged in two tanks filled with water and polyethylene glycol, a substance that helps to consolidate like parts. “Here we see one end of pirogue number 5 on the Lima River, they are monoxillary pirogues, which means that they were excavated from a single tree trunk, in this case, an oak with large dimensions and more than a century old. is there on the other side, they are dated from the end of the Iron Age, a little before the Romans entered the Iberian Peninsula, more or less two thousand years ago”, referee the coordinator of CNANS. Note that pirogue number 5, for example, has been in water since it was discovered in 2004. According to José António Gonçalves, the forecast is that it will stay in the tank where it is currently located for another four to six years and then spend another year in drying.
Drying is precisely the last step in this artefact conservation assembly line. Not CNANS, there are two drying spaces: a freeze-drying machine for smaller parts and a large container, more than eight meters long, a so-called atmospheric drying chamber, which currently houses, among other artefacts, “the last piece to enter , which is the Boavista 6, but also the Ria de Aveiro A, which is a prototype of a Portuguese caravel, “says the person in charge, automating that the parts go there disassembled.
Start of temporary functions
The move to the Xabregas facilities will be celebrated with an official inauguration until the end of the year and that will open a new chapter in the life of CNANS, the first exhibition open to the public. “We will have exposed pirogue number 2 and pirogue number 6. Interestingly, pirogue number 6, which is all deformed, was the last to be recovered, when all the conditions were in place for this not to happen, but when piroga was already like that. We hesitated between a number 1 and a number 2, but as the number 1 is ready to be delivered to the Caminha Museum and we didn’t want that to coincide with our temporary exhibition”, explains José António Gonçalves.
Ready to go is also a project that involves some huge anchors, currently leaning against a wall in the backyard, and small cannons. “We have a project that is closed to return these anchors to the sea and create an underwater reserve. There is a site already chosen, in Sesimbra, it is a project carried out in partnership with the Sesimbra Chamber. The idea is to combine an area that is already beginning to having the tradition of diving and being able to provide a museum reserve space that serves as a visiting circuit for divers.”