An awe-inspiring deep-dive into the treasures found on the sea floor and what they reveal about our past.
In Wonders in the Deep Mensun Bound, the renowned archaeologist who was the Director of Exploration on the team that discovered Ernest Shackleton's ship Endurance, argues that the history of the world is as much about maritime exploration and trade as it is about what happens on land. Using the many treasures Bound has discovered at the bottom of the sea and working with journalist Mark Frary, he sets out to write a maritime history of the world from 3000 BC to the present by way of the Ancient Romans and Egyptians, the Vikings and the Chinese, the Portuguese and Spanish and Dutch, through to the US Navy.
The objects include skeletons and sewing pins; cannonballs and peacocks; all preserved in shipwrecks hundreds - sometimes thousands - of years old. From Phoenician fertility statues to Corinthian helmets, a Chinese porcelain dish to a Nazi Eagle, the stories of these treasures tell us as much about these amazing objects as the people who used them, shining a light on how and why they found themselves at the bottom of the sea.
Interwoven throughout with beautiful photographs, Wonders in the Deep is a riveting story of human ambition, defeat and ingenuity.
The extraordinary story of how the Endurance, Sir Ernest Shackleton's ship, was found in the most hostile sea on Earth in 2022
On 21 November 1915, Sir Ernest Shackleton’s ship, Endurance, finally succumbed to the crushing ice. Its crew watched in silence as the stern rose twenty feet in the air and then, it was gone. The miraculous escape and survival of all twenty-eight men on board have entered legend. And yet, the iconic ship that bore them to the brink of the Antarctic was considered forever lost.
A century later, an audacious plan to locate the ship was hatched. The Ship Beneath the Ice gives a blow-by-blow account of the two epic expeditions to find the Endurance. As with Shackleton’s own story, the voyages were filled with intense drama and teamwork under pressure. In March 2022, the Endurance was finally found to headlines all over the world.
Written by Mensun Bound, the Director of Exploration on both expeditions, this captivating narrative includes countless fascinating stories of Shackleton and his legendary ship. Complete with a selection of Frank Hurley’s photos from Shackleton’s original voyage in 1914–17, as well as from the expeditions in 2019 and 2022, The Ship Beneath the Ice is the perfect tribute to this monumental discovery.
