The Enigma of Tantura B: Historical Documentation and the Lack of Circumstantial Documentary Evidence

Abstract

Tantura B is by far the first early Islamic shipwreck to be discovered off the Palestinian coast. Scientific evidence indicates that this vessel sank some time between the mid-8th and the mid-9th centuries. Neither archaeological remains nor historical sources can ascertain its exact function and origin due to the lack of circumstantial documentary evidence. However, it has been argued that the vessel could be either a coaster, capable of entering rivers or estuaries, or a support vessel operating in the Arab fleet, i.e. , it may have had been used for either military or civil purposes, or both.

Humbler Craft: Rafts of the Egyptian Nile, 17th to 20th Centuries AD

“…Without even the iconographic and depositional legacy left by the Pharaonic era, scholars are left with precious little data on which to work. While Khalilieh (2005: 318–9) has considered that the 8th‐9th‐century‐AD Tantura B wreck, discovered at Dor, Israel, might be a flat‐bottomed Nile vessel which had ventured into the Mediterranean, archaeologists have yet to have the satisfaction, and confirmation, of discovering such a vessel in a Nilotic context.…”