Le navire Génois de Villefranche, un naufrage de 1516 ?

The Mortella II & III Wrecks: premiminary observations on two 16th-century archaeological sites discovered in Saint-Florent Bay, Corsica, France

“…This suggests that the production of at least some of the shot probably occurred on board, and confirms what a French manuscript from 1518 teaches us about the production of shot on board ships (Departmental Archives of the Bouches‐du‐Rhône, 373 E 163, book set apart, 1518, f.1). These observations are consistent with those made on the Villefranche wreck, where several tens of shot in their rough state were discovered along with a half‐carved shot (Guérout et al ., 1989: 113).…”

“…The diameter of their muzzles (10 and 12 cm) is not—in their current state—representative of the calibre of the barrels, which we estimate at c .20 cm (Figs 11–12). The matter of the initial bore (without the concretion) of the 2‐m‐long barrels present on the Mortella II and III sites could find a theorical answer if we were to go by the rule drawn from the observation of a certain category of cannon‐barrels in Villefranche (between 1.5 and 2 m long) which states that the ratio between the number of sleeves and the bore would be 5/9 for this type of cannon (Guérout et al ., 1989: 106).…”

“…This calculation appears relatively consistent with the diameter of the largest stone shot that we extracted from both sites, which is c .22 cm. It must be added that the relationship between the diameter of the shot and the bore of the cannons cannot be precisely determined because archaeology has shown, notably with the study of the cannons of the Mary Rose (1545), that the difference between the bore of barrels and the diameter of shot during the Renaissance period can reach 10% (Guérout et al ., 1989: 101). In any case, the use of electrolysis on one or more cannons extracted from the site must be considered in order to be able to study them in detail and to compare them effectively to known naval artillery from this period.…”

“…These dimensions can be compared to those of the keels of several wrecks of great ships from the Renaissance like the Mary Rose (1545), Angra D (Portugal, 16th to 17th century) or the Villefranche wreck ( Lomellina , 1516) whose measurements are noticeably equal at this distance from the heel of the keel (Fig. 21) (Rule, 1982; Guérout et al ., 1989; Monteiro, 1999). A notable characteristic of this keel is its progressive and pronounced increase in size from the rear to the front, since from a sided dimension of 40 cm at a distance of 3 m from the heel we arrive at a sided dimension of nearly 50 cm a bit before the M1 floor‐timber, at 5 m from the heel.…”

The Discovery of a Medieval Galley in Turkey? A Review

“…comm. A. Canalini, 2006) and which is clearly a boat and not a ship, and do not quote wrecks of ships of this period such as Villefranche‐sur‐mer (Guérout et al ., 1989). Finally, and most questionable, is Royal's declaration that ‘as flat‐bottomed pottery is common throughout the medieval period, the armament and anchors on this wreck‐site are more chronologically diagnostic’.…”