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Search for Sea Battle Remains
Chinese underwater archaeologists are going to look for the remains of over
1,000 warships that were sunk some 700 years ago. The search will take place
in the Yinzhou Lake in Guangdong Province.
The lake was part of the Yamen Sea where the epic battle between the Yuan Dynasty
(1271-1368) and the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279) took place in 1279. According
to Zhang Wei, Director of the Underwater Archaeology Department of the Beijing-based
National Museum of Chinese History, archaeologists and oceanographers have been
cooperating in determining the locations of the wreckage.
They took a piece of wood from a ship in one of the locations and found that it dates back to the time of the battle. Historical records show that the Mongols, led by Kublai Khan, invaded China and drove the imperial court of the Southern Song Dynasty to the southern part of the mainland in 1277.
In 1279, the Southern Song's fleet of some 2,000 warships attacked by Kublai Khan's Yuan army, and only about 800 escaped. A minister of the Southern Song, with the young emperor on his back, jumped into the sea to commit suicide, and the dynasty was finished.
Most of the sea area where the battle took place has dried up over the past 700 years, leaving only the lake, where pieces of pottery, porcelain and boards of ships have been frequently found. This suggests that some of the sunken ships may be buried in land but others may remain at the bottom of the lake, said Yu Weichao, a prominent archaeologist.
