Chapter 9 Project How a Shipwreck Helps Us Understand Exchange Background Over 3,000 years ago, a merchant ship carrying around 20 tons of precious cargo was wrecked off the coast of what is now Turkey. In 1982, a Turkish sponge-diver chanced upon this spectacularly preserved wreck and notified archaeologists. For over a decade underwater archaeologists excavated this site, now known as the Uluburun shipwrecke They made over 22,500 dives and, thanks to this colossal effort, we have learned more about exchange in the Bronze Age Mediterranean than we ever thought possible.