Mentor Shipwreck Excavation Programme
Underwater Archaeology at Kythera, Greece
In September 2023, the Hellenic Archaeological Exploration Society participated in the Mentor Shipwreck Excavation Programme at Avlemonas, Kythera, Greece.
The archaeological investigation is conducted by Greece's Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities, the department of the Hellenic Ministry of Culture responsible for the protection, investigation, and management of Greece's underwater cultural heritage.
HAES participated in the expedition in support of its mission to advance archaeological research, education, documentation, and public outreach through collaboration.
The Mentor project provided an opportunity to experience underwater archaeological fieldwork firsthand while helping bring that work to a wider audience.
Bringing the Expedition to a Wider Audience
The Mentor Documentary
As part of HAES's participation in the 2023 expedition, HAES founder Kosta Koeman financed the production of a documentary about the archaeological investigation. The film follows the expedition and introduces viewers to the work involved in investigating an underwater archaeological site. Rather than focusing solely on recovered objects, the documentary provides a look at the people, methods, diving operations, and archaeological process behind the research.
Portions of the documentary are intended for use at the new Museum of Underwater Antiquities being developed in Piraeus, Greece. The objective is to allow people who may never participate in an underwater excavation to experience how underwater archaeology is actually conducted.
The Wreck of the Mentor
A Ship Connected to the Parthenon Sculptures
The brig Mentor sank off Kythera in 1802 while transporting antiquities collected by agents of Lord Elgin. Among its cargo were crates containing sculptures removed from the Parthenon and other monuments of the Acropolis of Athens. The passengers and crew survived, and much of the antiquities cargo was subsequently recovered. The wreck itself, however, remained on the seafloor. More than two centuries later, Mentor continues to provide archaeologists with information about the vessel, its cargo, maritime activity of the period, and the circumstances surrounding its final voyage.
Today, the wreck is an archaeological site in its own right.
Archaeological Investigation
The Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities
The archaeological investigation of Mentor is conducted by Greece's Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities. Underwater archaeology is painstaking work. Sediment must be carefully removed, artifacts documented in context, measurements recorded, discoveries conserved, and the archaeological relationships between objects understood before material is disturbed.
The objective is not simply to recover artifacts. The position and relationship of objects within an archaeological site can provide information that an artifact alone cannot. Each excavation season therefore adds another piece to the understanding of the wreck and the people associated with it. Archaeology preserves not only objects, but the information that gives those objects meaning.
From Participation to Project eNiGMA
What We Learned Underwater
Participation in the Mentor excavation also helped inform HAES's thinking about how technology could further support underwater archaeologists. Human divers remain essential to underwater archaeology, but diving introduces limitations in depth, bottom time, environmental conditions, logistics, and safety.
Remotely operated vehicles, sonar, underwater imaging, and emerging underwater three-dimensional scanning technologies can complement divers by allowing archaeologists to investigate and document areas that may be difficult, time-consuming, or unsafe to examine using conventional methods alone.
That experience contributed to the development of Project eNiGMA — Next Generation Maritime Archaeology, HAES's initiative exploring the integration of ROVs and advanced remote-sensing technologies for underwater archaeological research. Technology does not replace the archaeologist. It expands the places archaeologists can investigate and the information they can collect.
Supporting Underwater Archaeology
The Mentor expedition demonstrates the collaborative model at the heart of HAES. Greece's Ephorate of Underwater Antiquities leads and conducts the archaeological investigation of the wreck, bringing a team of archaeologists, divers, conservators, and specialists required to investigate, document, and protect the site.
Organizations such as HAES can support this work by contributing resources, funding, technical expertise, documentation, and public outreach while helping connect archaeological researchers with technologies developed in the commercial and scientific communities.
HAES's participation in the Mentor expedition also provided valuable firsthand insight into the practical challenges of underwater archaeological fieldwork. That experience helps guide our efforts to identify technologies that can complement traditional archaeological methods and expand the capabilities available to underwater researchers.
Our role is not to direct the archaeology. It is to support the archaeologists responsible for it and help make useful technologies and resources available to them. Discovery is only the beginning. Careful documentation, research, preservation, and public understanding are what give discovery lasting value.