Endangered maritime archaeology in North Africa – the MarEA Project

Abstract

Increasing pressure – such as from conflict, climate change and urbanisation – on maritime cultural heritage in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) led to the establishment of the Maritime Endangered Archaeology (MarEA) Project in 2019. This five-year programme aims to assess rapidly and comprehensively the vulnerability of maritime and coastal heritage in the MENA region and assist in its management in the face of the aforementioned challenges. The two case studies discussed in this article highlight some of the main aspects of MarEA's current work in North Africa by focusing on two different aspects of the methodological approach used: first, the generalised but comprehensive damage and threat assessment, as applied to all sites, and demonstrated for the historic port of Suakin (Sudan); second, site-specific shoreline change assessment for the purpose of assessing the impact of coastal erosion, as demonstrated for the World Heritage Site of Sabratha (Libya).

6 Shipwreck archaeology in the past 10 years

“…Contemporary philosophy includes Indigenous and non-Western modes of thought (Morton 2013) and the past decade has seen important capacity-building and centring of Global South research in maritime archaeology, especially in addressing climate change and the economic impacts of maritime culture on communities (Blue and Breen 2019;Demesticha, Semaan and Morsy 2019;Henderson 2019;Henderson et al 2021;Holly et al 2022). This includes the capacity for the protection of underwater heritage from threats of looting and destruction (Recinos and Blue 2019;Nikolaus et al 2023). Decolonization and collaboration with Indigenous communities require broader engagement within the field (Rich and Campbell 2023b: 45), but recent studies demonstrate the discoveries that can arise from collaborations and how interpretations change with non-Western modes of thought (Wiseman et al 2021;Rich et al 2022).…”