All elements of the 1715 shipwreck which we excavated in summer 2023 were measured, recorded and catalogued in full detail.

Trident Archäologie was commissioned in 2023 to excavate and recover the Mönchgut Fpl. 46 shipwreck to prevent it from being impaired or even destroyed by the planned construction of a pipeline.

The shipwreck is part of the Swedish ship barrier of 1715, which was intended to impede access to the Bay of Greifswald and so protect the town of Stralsund from an approaching Danish fleet. To this end, the Swedes sank around 20 ships in a long line across the former fairway at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, which is only a few meters deep here. Due to the large number of archaeological finds in this area, it was unfortunately not possible to circumvent the site, so the only possible protective measure was to recover the wreck.

In the summer of 2023, we conducted a campaign over several weeks to excavate, document and recover the ship. All individual parts of the ship were stored in two temporary water basins and examined, recorded and documented in more detail in November and December 2023.

The work was complicated by the early and unusually harsh winter conditions with severe cold, which even caused ice to form on the water basins. It was therefore hard and strenuous work under these conditions for the team to clean the timbers and prepare them for 3D documentation with structured light scanners.

However, the result of these efforts is well worth seeing: Not only do we now have a digital three-dimensional image of the entire shipwreck, but also a catalogue of all the timber parts, with each individual element annotated with a precise description of, for example, the wooden nails and drill holes, all visible tool marks and the texture of the surface.

As the final phase of the project, we will return to the Bay of Greifswald next summer to transport all the ship timbers back to the seabed, where they will be stored in a secure underwater depot, permanently protected deep in the sediment.