16th International Symposium on Boat & Ship Archaeology

34 16 th International Symposium on Boat & Ship Archaeology Thijs Coenen 1 , Alice Overmeer 2 & Heidi Vink 1 1 Cultural Heritage Agency of Netherlands (RCE), the Netherlands 2 independent researcher, the Netherlands An early lapstrake-and-carvel ship fragment from Terschelling, the Netherlands During a long, stormy night on February 12 th , 2020, a large ship fragment ap- peared on the North Sea shore of the Dutch island of Terschelling. The morning after, locals found the shipwreck, and pulled it apart with their four-wheel drives. The remaining parts were documented by the authors through drawing and pho- togrammetry. The timbers turned out to have belonged to an interesting ship, of which the hull was partly clinker-built and partly carvel-built. The fragment measured 9 m in length and 4 m in height. It consisted of nine strakes and twenty futtocks. The six lower strakes were lapstrake laid and inter- connected with rivets as well as small wooden treenails. The three upmost strakes were flush laid. During the assemblage, the latter had been temporarily fastened by clamps, which were removed when the frames were inserted. The remaining nail holes were filled with square wooden plugs, so-called spijkerpennen . The ship was thus built entirely shell-first. The combination of a lapstrake hull in the underwater ship and flush strakes above the waterline had not yet been found in the Netherlands before. A few ex- amples are known from Germany and Scandinavia. The term ‘half-carvel’ is often used for ships built in this way, but it is not sure whether this was a common term at the time and should therefore be used with caution. The Terschelling shipwreck was dated AD 1546 (springtime), and is the ear- liest example of this building method in Europe. Thus this interesting ship part originates from a period of change, in which transition from clinker to carvel hull construction took place. This paper will present the latest results of the research. The wreck will be compared to similar finds from Northwest Europe, in order to place it in a wider context of European shipbuilding traditions.