56°8′41.2″N 15°13′15.3″E / 56.144778°N 15.220917°E / 56.144778; 15.220917[1]

History
Denmark
NameGribshunden, Gribshund, Gripshunden, Gripshund, Griff, Griffen, or Griffone
In service1486
Out of service1495
FateBurned down and sank in 1495
StatusShipwreck
General characteristics
Length35 m (115 ft)[2]
Beam7.5 m (25 ft)[2]
PropulsionSails
Complement150 men[3]
Armament11 iron cannons[1][3][4]

Gribshunden or Griffen (English: "Griffin-Hound"[2] or "Griffin"), also known by several variant names including Gribshund, Gripshunden, Gripshund, Griff, and Griffone, was a Danish warship, the flagship of John, King of Denmark (r. 1481–1513).[2] Gribshunden sank in 1495 after catching fire while in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Ronneby in southeastern Sweden; she is one of the best-preserved wrecks from the late medieval period.[2][5]

History

The first known mention of the ship is in a letter, dated May 16, 1486, in which John, King of Denmark, wrote "in navi nostra Griffone", Latin for "in our ship Griffon".[2] Gribshunden and its variant names were then subsequently recorded in the Danish fleet's ship lists from 1487 to 1495.[1][3][6]

In summer 1495, John set sail for Kalmar, Sweden, to enter into negotiations with Sten Sture the Elder, the Swedish leader who was threatening to break the Swedes away from the Kalmar Union.[2][3][4] As the premier ship of the Danish fleet, Gribshunden was a symbol of military power intended to help deter the Swedes from independence.[2][3][7]

However, on the way to Kalmar, while anchored in the Baltic Sea at the natural harbor near the port of Ronneby, Sweden, Gribshunden caught fire.[8] This event was recorded in the contemporaneous Swedish Sturekrönikan (The Sture Chronicle) and in two German sources, Reimar Koch's Lübeck Chronicle and Caspar Weinreich's Danzig Chronicle.[1][2][3][9] John himself was not aboard at the time, but, as reported by expedition member Tyge Krabbe, many of the 150 crewmen who were on the ship died as it sank.[2][3][4] John continued to Kalmar after the loss of his flagship, but Sten Sture did not turn up for the meeting, leaving the status of the Kalmar Union in limbo for the next two years until the 1497 Battle of Rotebro, wherein the Union was reaffirmed by John's victory and Sten's defeat.[2][3]

The wreck

In the 1970s, the local diving club found the wreck at a depth of 10 m (33 ft), in the southwestern Baltic Sea north of Stora Ekön (English: "Great Oak Island"), an island in the Blekinge archipelago off the coast of Ronneby in southeastern Sweden.[1][2][3][6] Unaware of the identity and significance of the wreck, the divers did not tell archaeologists about the discovery until 2000; the first archaeological investigations followed in 2001 and 2002.[1][2][3][4] In 2013, archaeologists identified the ship as Gribshunden[2][3][6] through such techniques as dendrochronological sampling of the ship's timbers, which showed that they came from oak trees felled in the winter of 1482–1483.[1][10][11]

The wooden ship is in remarkably good condition and is among the best-preserved ships from the late medieval period.[2][5] That the wreckage has been left relatively free of sea worm damage has been attributed to the brackishness of the waters.[9]

The ship is also significant for being carvel-built, the oldest such found in Nordic waters, which were at the time dominated by clinker-built ships.[2][4][9] Surveys of the wreck indicate the ship had a length of 35 m (115 ft) and a beam of 7.5 m (25 ft).[2] The keel is oriented northeast to southwest.[3]

Among the military artifacts found in the wreckage are chain mail, crossbows, bones, barrels, glass, and capstans.[4] The shipwreck remains loaded with artillery consisting of iron cannons, of which 11 mountings have been counted.[1][3][4][12] The artillery consists of light, anti-personnel guns and were not intended for the sinking of ships. Instead, they mainly offered support for hand-to-hand combat forces, which constituted the main fighting force.[2][12][13] The infantry also was capable of fighting at medium ranges as evidenced by the finds from the recent excavation of 2019 (led by Södertörn University, Lund University, and Blekinge Museum) which uncovered, among other things, a crossbow, crossbow bolt, handgonne (early handheld firearm), and mail armor.[12][14] A 13.5-foot-long gun carriage and carved linstock was found in 2021.[15]

In August 2015, the ship attracted international media attention when a near perfectly-preserved wooden figurehead, weighing about 250 kg (551 lb), of a mythical beast was recovered from the stem and brought to the surface.[2][5][6][9][10][16] Suggestive of the ship's Gribshunden ("Griffin-Hound") name, the chimeric figurehead is described as a dog-like or dragon-like sea monster with lion ears, devouring a person in its crocodilian mouth.[2][5][6][9][10][16]

A 2019-2021 led excavation has additionally found silver coins, decorated wall paneling in birch, wood tankard emblazoned with a crown, slippers, and exotic spices.[15][17]

A 2021 episode of the American science show NOVA profiles the underwater archeological investigation of Gribshunden.[18]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h "RAÄ-nummer Ronneby 728" [RAÄ-number Ronneby 728] (in Swedish). Swedish National Heritage Board Riksantikvarieämbetet. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Warming, Rolf (2015-07-01). "Gribshunden: Significance and Preliminary Investigations". Combat Archaeology. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m Einarsson, Av Lars. "Ett skeppsvrak i Ronneby skärgård" [A shipwreck in Ronneby archipelago] (PDF) (in Swedish). Kalmar Läns Museum [Kalmar County Museum]. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g "Ett Skeppsvrak i Ronneby Skärgård" [A Shipwreck in Ronneby Archipelago] (in Swedish). Blekinge Museum. Archived from the original on 2013-12-31. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  5. ^ a b c d "Medieval ship's 'sea monster' figurehead raised from Baltic". BBC News. 2015-08-12. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  6. ^ a b c d e Hansen, Jesper Haue (2015-08-11). "Dansk "monster" fra 1495 hevet op af dybet i Sverige" [Danish "monster" from 1495 pulled out of the depths in Sweden]. Jyllands-Posten [Jutland-Post] (in Danish). Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  7. ^ Rauscher, Alexander; Sund, Peter Gren; Theander, Martin (2015-08-12). "Världsunikt dykfynd — ett hungrigt monster" [World-unique diving find — a hungry monster]. Svenska Dagbladet [Swedish Daily Paper] (in Swedish). Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  8. ^ Patel, Samir S (Jan–Feb 2016). "A Baltic Sea Monster Surfaces" (PDF). Archaeology. 69 (1): 16. ISSN 0003-8113. Retrieved 31 August 2017 – via EBSCO.
  9. ^ a b c d e Hays, Brooks (2015-08-13). "Medieval wooden 'sea monster' pulled from Baltic Sea". UPI. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  10. ^ a b c Grimm, Nick (2015-08-12). "500-year-old figurehead recovered from sunken Danish warship". ABC News. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  11. ^ "Fartygs-/båtlämning" [Ships-/boatwreck]. Kringla database (in Swedish). Swedish National Heritage Board Riksantikvarieämbetet. 2008-05-13. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  12. ^ a b c Warming, Rolf (January 2019). "An Introduction to Hand-to-Hand Combat at Sea: General Characteristics and Shipborne Technologies from c. 1210 BCE to 1600 CE". On War on Board: Archaeological and Historical Perspectives on Early Modern Maritime Violence and Warfare (Ed. Johan Rönnby).
  13. ^ Warming, Rolf. "Society for Combat Archaeology – Notes on the Guns and Gun Carriages Aboard GRIBSHUNDEN (1495)". Retrieved 2021-01-24.
  14. ^ Warming, Rolf (January 2021). "Ringbrynja och armborst från Gribshunden (1495)". Grifun/Gribshund (1495): Marinarkeologiska undersökningar.
  15. ^ a b Marchant, Jo. "An Extraordinary 500-Year-Old Shipwreck Is Rewriting the History of the Age of Discovery". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved 2021-10-21.
  16. ^ a b "Stort bildspel från bärgningen" [Great slideshow from salvage]. Blekinge Läns Tidning [Blekinge County News] (in Swedish). 2015-08-13. Retrieved 2015-08-13.
  17. ^ Georgiou, Aristos (9 February 2023). "Shipwreck of 500-Year-Old Floating Castle Found to Contain 'Thrilling Haul'". Newsweek. Retrieved 11 February 2023. includes additional photographs of findings from the wreck and maps
  18. ^ "NOVA episode". June 2021.
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