The Lead Ingots from the Wreck of theZuiddorp(1712), Western Australia: a report on their provenance and manufacture

Abstract

The Dutch United East India Company ship Zuiddorp vanished on its way to Batavia in 1712 – its last port of call was the Cape of Good Hope. After its wreck was found on the Western Australian coast, archaeological investigations resulted in the retrieval of 21 lead ingots. Recent study of this artefact assemblage, comprising both great pigs and pieces, suggests that they were of north English origin. Historical records indicate that the Dutch procured large quantities of lead from English sources and maritime trade links between English and Dutch ports were well established at the beginning of the 18th century. © 2012 The Authors

Response: the discovery of New Zealand's oldest shipwreck

“…Moreover, to date, not a single Dutch ship from the seventeenth or early eighteenth centuries has been found with a copper sheathed hull (Gawronski, 1996;Van Duivenvoorde, 2008). Suggestions have been made by specialists in Dutch shipbuilding (including this reviewer) that the VOC shipyard in Amsterdam probably did use copper sheathing, although not extensively, in the 1740s, but no archaeological evidence has been found yet to substantiate this hypothesis (Gawronski, 1996;Van Duivenvoorde, 2008;Van Duivenvoorde, 2013). The only archaeological evidence for copper sheathing on Dutch ships from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries comes from sheets of copper that were used to protect the stern rudder, keel and stem of ships, so to assume that copper sheathing found on a shipwreck site is planking sheathing without giving any supporting evidence is dubious at best (Van Duivenvoorde, 2008).…”

The Norman's Bay Shipwreck, East Sussex, UK: a possible 17th‐century Dutch ship from the Battle of Beachy Head

“…It should be considered that 17th‐century ships, including Dutch VOC ships, were often recorded as carrying scrap metal as ballast, including swivel‐guns, breech‐blocks, iron guns, and broken anchors when other ballast was not available. On occasion, ships even set sail to the Netherlands with a ballast of ‘good cannon’ (Van Duivenvoorde et al ., : 154). While it cannot be ruled out that part or all of the assemblage of 51 guns on the Norman's Bay wreck may have been ballast, the presence of a large stone ballast mound on the site makes this less unlikely.…”

Pigment geochemistry as chronological marker: The case of lead pigment in rock art in the Urrmarning ‘Red Lily Lagoon’ rock art precinct, western Arnhem Land

“…Indigenous and British interactions in the area intensified with the development of the buffalo hunting industry in the 1890s and is known to have involved the bartering and exchange of high value items, such as metals and tobacco (Powell 1996). Lead was a very common multipurpose metal in colonial times, used variously for minting coins, water pipes, lead-based paints, sheeting, sheathing for hulls, anchor stocks, seals, stamps, tablets, musket balls and shot cartridges (Tripati et al 2003;van Duivenvoorde et al 2013). The largest amounts of lead transported, however, were most likely ship ballast.…”