Exposition „Anchors and Anchor Stocks“ Lapidarium
The first monuments related to ancient seafaring on the Western Black Sea coast entered the collection of the National Museum of History in 1978, and in 1987 the museum began its first underwater expeditions in the waters of the town of Sozopol. These expeditions are connected with the discovery of numerous well-preserved anchors and anchor stocks. Thanks to the systematic research, the National Museum of History has a collection of ancient anchors, anchor stocks and details from them. It is the richest collection in the world for a museum that is not located on the seashore, and it is constantly growing (at present, there are 167 items).
The highlight of the renovated exhibition are two iron cannons (carronades) discovered at the end of 2022 by Dr. Nayden Prahov (Director of the Center for Underwater Archeology – Sozopol) in the area of Ezerets village, Shabla Municipality. Under a project funded by the Ministry of Culture, the cannons were transported to the National Museum of History, preserved and displayed.
The cannons on display – carronades – are short, smooth-bore cast iron naval guns for close combat, popular in European fleets from the 1770s to the 1880s.
This type of cannon is light and relatively easy to operate, requiring a small crew. This makes it particularly suitable for arming merchant ships in wartime, which are operated by relatively inexperienced civilian sailors.
The characteristic typological features of the two cannons suggest that they date back to the first half of the 19th century. Although we cannot say with certainty from which ship the carronades from the village of Ezerets originate, we know from historical sources that during the Crimean War (1853-1856) in the area of Shabla – Ezerets village, dozens of English and French transport ships providing for the British-French-Ottoman allied landing on the Crimean Peninsula were wrecked as a result of sea currents. The relatively small-calibre cannonballs from Ezerets most likely came from the defensive armament of one of those transport ships.
