A full-time team of divers, professional diving archaeologists and conser-
vators were recruited to do the fieldwork and a small team including a press
officer, scientists, illustrators and conservators worked on the finds once they
were ashore.
A programme of sampling the sediments that had begun in 1977 was
enhanced and an environmental scientist was employed by the Trust in 1979
to analyse the material and select samples for appraisal by consultants. The
strategy of the sampling programme was two pronged:
First – To identify environmental material derived from containers
including barrels and boxes or as contaminants on clothing,
cordage and dunnage.
Second – To identify a series of microenvironments within and around
the ship.This was necessary in order to understand the complex processes of sedi-
mentation, preservation and collapse, which occurred immediately after the
ship sank and the series of events that occurred after the wreck was buried
and localised intrusions occurred (see Figure 3).
6 Chapter 1
Figure 3Silts between decks on the Mary Rose. The fine sediments that filled most of the
lower hull had never been disturbed, and in this anaerobic environment organic
materials such as silk, leather and wood were well-preserved