The Nossa Senhora dos Mártires, is the name of a cargo ship wrecked in 1606 at the mouth of the

River Tagus The Tagus ( ; es, Tajo ; pt, Tejo ; see below) is the longest river in the Iberian Peninsula. The river rises in the Montes Universales near Teruel, in mid-eastern Spain, flows , generally west with two main south-westward sections, to e ...

, near Lisbon,

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...

, and subsequently excavated between 1996 and 2001. The ship had been seeking safer anchorage in the Tagus during strong winds, but she struck a submerged rock and went down close to shore with no loss of life. Also known as The Pepper Wreck, it is so called because its major cargo at the time was peppercorns of black pepper, ''

Piper nigrum Black pepper (''Piper nigrum'') is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, known as a peppercorn, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit is a drupe (stonefruit) which is about in diame ...

'', which carpeted the river and were harvested along with the fittings and other cargo by the population. The Museu Nacional de Arqueologia identified the debris on the bottom in 1993 and designated the site as São Julião da Barra 2 (SJB2). The ship was of a type called the " ''nau''", a cargo vessel, used as an

Indiaman East Indiaman was a general name for any sailing ship operating under charter or licence to any of the East India trading companies of the major European trading powers of the 17th through the 19th centuries. The term is used to refer to vesse ...

. Constructed in 1605 in the Ribeira das Naus, the royal shipyard in Lisbon, it set sail under captain Manuel Barreto in that year as part of an armada, or convoy, consisting of ten ships: four

galleon Galleons were large, multi-decked sailing ships first used as armed cargo carriers by European states from the 16th to 18th centuries during the age of sail and were the principal vessels drafted for use as warships until the Anglo-Dutch W ...

s and six naus, sent out by the Casa da Índia, a government trade organization,Castro (2005) page 13. to

Goa Goa () is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is located between the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north and Karnataka to the ...

, then under Dutch blockade. After loading a cargo of pepper, classified by the government along with all

spice A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring or coloring food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, or stems of plants used for flavoring or as a garnish. Spice ...

s as ''drogas'' ("drugs", literally meaning "dry goods") it completed the return voyage and anchored off the mouth of the Tagus. A strong wind caused some other ships to pull anchor, inspiring their captains to move further into the river. Seeking to follow their example, the ''Nossa Senhora dos Mártires'' struck a rock and went down suddenly. The date was 14 September 1606. Although scanty, the hull remains have preserved carpenters marks that allowed a tentative reconstruction of the ship's hull. Until the 2008 discovery of the '' Bom Jesus'' shipwreck near

Oranjemund Oranjemund (German for ''"Mouth of Orange"'') is a diamond mining town of 4,000 inhabitants situated in the ǁKaras Region of the extreme southwest of Namibia, on the northern bank of the Orange River mouth at the border to South Africa. Histo ...

in Namibia, this shipwreck was the only known Portuguese Indiaman from the 16th and early 17th centuries not destroyed by treasure hunters.

Notes

Bibliography

External links

* Age of Sail ships of Portugal Shipwrecks of Portugal Maritime incidents in 1606 Colonial Kerala 17th century in Portugal 17th-century ships {{ship-stub