Abstract:

This contribution presents a first approach to the cargo of the late Roman shipwreck of Ses Fontanelles, recently found off the island of Mallorca (Balearic Islands, Spain). A first excavation campaign carried out in 2019 yielded a significant sample of the vessel’s cargo. The typological study of the materials has identified most containers with the Almagro 51c type, which contained a fish sauce (liquaminis flos) as indicated by the preserved tituli picti. The cargo also included a smaller number of flat-bottomed amphorae that seem to have transported olives preserved in wine, wine, or other wine by-product, and a type of oil amphora, reminiscent of southern Hispanic types, which has been tentatively called Ses Fontanelles I. A few amphorae of the Keay XIX type (=Almagro 51a-b) were also identified. The results of the typological study and the petrographic characteriza-tion are to a large extent compatible with an origin in south-eastern Iberia, except for the Keay XIX amphorae, which could be from the Malaga area, in the southern coast. All of this suggests that the ship probably sailed from the area of Cartagena and sank in the waters of the bay of Palma in the fourth century.