A few timber house beams sunk in the ground, rough stone tools and some ceramic storage vessels were all that the deep-water research team found off the Turkish coastline, under the wave-tossed surface of the Black Sea. But it was enough to convince them they now had proof that the flood and Noah's ark, described in Genesis, were real.
The crude dwelling, dating back to perhaps 5500BC, indicated that the Black Sea shoreline was inhabited at the time of a massive flood, when an avalanche of water broke through a natural earthen barrier from the Mediterranean. Millions of tonnes of salt water poured into what was then a freshwater sea, engulfing communities along the shore and burying their homes for ever under as much as 550 feet of water.
These few artefacts were "the first concrete evidence for the occupation of the Black Sea coast prior to its flooding", according to expedition archaeologist Dr Fredrik Hiebert of the University of Pennsylvania. "This is a major discovery that will rewrite the history of civilisations in this key area between Europe, Asia and the Middle East," he said.
The expedition was led by Dr Robert Ballard, the scientist who rocketed to world prominence after discovering the resting place of the ill-fated Titanic in the deep waters of the north Atlantic. He used similar deep-water expertise and equipment to reach down into the inky depths of the Black Sea in a search for evidence of a cataclysmic flood. The work was partly funded by the US National Geographic Society.
Stories of a great flood are common to many mythologies and religions around the world. The Bible's Old Testament describes Noah's trials; a similar flood is described in The Epic of Gilgmesh, and a flood catastrophe is found in Greek and Roman mythology.
Far from arising solely from the human imagination, careful scientific research is now beginning to show that many legends start from some basic truth, a natural event that cannot be explained. The humans witnessing such events have no rational explanation for them and create stories that are handed down through the ages.
So it could be with the flood which evidence now suggests overwhelmed the Black Sea about 5500BC. This was no little event that dampened a few basements or left a few soggy fields. Its size and impact were considered in a 1999 book, Noah's Flood, by Columbia University marine geologists Dr William Ryan and Dr Walter Pitman.
Their story begins 12,000 years ago as the last Ice Age came to a close and the Earth's temperatures rose. This caused a huge ice melt that went on for centuries, raising water levels around the globe. At that time the Black Sea was a freshwater sea separated from the Mediterranean by a natural geological structure near what are now the Bosphorus Straits. As levels in the Mediterranean climbed they put increasing pressure on this wall, which eventually crumbled an estimated 7,500 years ago.
A saltwater torrent rushed into the Black Sea at a rate equal to about 200 times the flow of the Niagara Falls. This would have been a dramatic sight close to the Straits, but settlers living along the coast many miles away would only have been conscious of a dramatic rise in the water level.
Ryan and Pitman suggest that water levels could have gone up by about 15 cm per day in a relentless and seemingly unending manner. The water level rose by about 550 feet before the flood ended, having sunk many communities under its waters and greatly altering the lake's coastline. An area of land the size of Costa Rica would have gone under the waves.
Ballard's team first visited the Black Sea in 1999 with research ships and remotely operated camera-carrying minisubs. He was looking for signs of the original Black Sea coastline and found it 550 feet down, a submerged, ancient shoreline with a flat beach area. Samples of shells and sediment were collected and radiocarbon-dated to about 7,500 years ago.
AMONG the sediments, however, was a piece of obsidian (volcanic glass), used by people in the ancient Near East to shape blades and arrows. This suggested that perhaps humans also occupied these shores, and Ballard and the team decided to return this year to search for signs of this occupation.
Such a find was considered a very long shot, and so the team committed only two weeks to the venture. All this quickly changed, however, after the discovery was made less than two weeks ago, on Friday, September 8th.
Ballard's minisub cameras picked out a rectangular feature about 13 yards long and 4.4 yards wide at the intersection of two ancient inland river channels. The find was made at a depth of about 310 feet, and inspection confirmed it was the timber framing of a dwelling.
"The building [has] carved wooden beams, wooden branches and stone tools collapsed among the mud matrix of the structure," Dr Ballard said. Dr Hiebert recognised one of the tools as a stone axe, which looked exactly like one on display in a nearby archaeology museum. "I expected to write it off," Dr Ballard said soon after the discovery. "I've never seen anything like that before, and I've seen a lot of things."
The team are confident they will find much more evidence of human habitation, in part because the freshwater sea was overcome by salt water. The denser salt water sank immediately to the bottom, thus preventing the exchange of oxygen with the upper levels of the lake. This in turn created an anoxic "dead zone" which should have kept wood-consuming organisms such as wood-boring molluscs from devouring both the new find and anything deeper down.
The wooden structure is the only building sighted so far, but Dr Ballard said sonar profiles had identified more than 50 potential search areas similar to the site of the structure. There is no telling what they might find deeper down, however, given the speed with which the flood would have overtaken coastal communities.
Ancient ships may lie completely intact, still moored to their piers. Entire villages might be entombed in the dead layer, looking just as they did when the waters started to rise.
The team is also seeking permission from the Turkish government to take timber samples from the structure. These would provide a much more accurate radiocarbon date for the flood, better than that provided by the shells and sediments.
The Black Sea was an important link in ancient trade routes between Greece, Egypt and the Near East. News of the inundation would have spread quickly, with each culture coming up with its own explanation. The magnitude of the event, however, would have demanded a story of biblical proportions.
Further information from: nationalgeographic.com
