Stone anchor
Ancla de piedra perforada
- Date
- c. 2500 BCE · confidence low
- Place
- Byblos, Lebanon and Ugarit, Syria
- Credited to
- Canaanite and Egyptian seafarers
- Field
- Movement
⚠️ Disputed: the sources disagree.
What it is
Stone block with one or more holes for the mooring rope and for wooden stakes driven into the seabed. It allows anchoring in an open roadstead to wait for a favourable wind or to spend the night at sea.
Stone anchors are hard to date; examples from the temple of Byblos and from Uluburun (c. 1300 BCE) are the best documented.
What it led to
- Coastal navigation with safe anchorages and stable routes
- Anchors as temple offerings (Byblos, Ugarit, Kition), a sign of a seafaring religion
- Regional anchor typologies that today allow the Bronze Age trade routes to be traced
Built on
- Square sail and seagoing plank boatc. 3000 BCE
- Fibre cord and rope
Made possible
- Red Sea port of Mersa/Wadi Gawasis (Punt expeditions)c. 1900 BCE (Reino Medio)
- Lead-and-wood anchor (Iron Age)
- Artificial harbour