AFP on August 1 (local time) said Greece opened the world’s first underwater museum for visitors to admire antiquities more than two thousand years old.
Tourists visit the shipwreck and many precious vases
Greece inaugurated an underwater museum for the first time to attract visitors, this is a unique form during the Covid-19 pandemic. The “artifact” of the exhibition is actually the wreck of a sunken merchant ship containing thousands of precious vases dating from the 5th century BC.
The exhibition location is located off the coast of Alonissos island (Greece). The inauguration ceremony was attended by archaeologist and Greek Minister of Culture Lina Mendoni.
This unique exhibition is open from August 3 to October 2 for amateur divers, while those who cannot dive can watch the “wonders” of history through virtual reality technology in a village on the island of Alonissos.
Precious wine bottles sank with the ship that carried them thousands of years ago
Maria Agalou, President of the Alonissos council, told the media: “The ship sank at a depth of 21 to 28 meters near the coast of the island of Peristera (located east of Alonissos), carrying 3,000 to 4,000 precious vases.”
According to many sources, these thousands of years old jars were first discovered by fishermen in 1985.
These are wine bottles brought from the Chalkidiki peninsula (Northern Greece) and the island of Skopelos, also in Greece, but the merchant ship unfortunately sank during the journey. The time period of the shipwreck was determined by researchers to be somewhere around 425 BC.
These ancient precious wine jars help researchers determine the shape of the ship that carried them. Authorities on Alonissos island now plan to open four more diving areas around the “underwater museum” to attract more tourists.
