Bom Jesus (1533)
Country: Namibia
Place: Oranjemund
Type: Nau
Identified: Yes
Dated: 1533 (Historical accounts)
Introduction
Bom Jesus was an early oceangoing nau, built in Portugal and lost on the coast of today’s Namibia in 1533. It disappeared at sea, never to be seen or heard from until a part of its remains was at Oranjemund, on April 1st, 2008.
The artifacts and the ship remains were saved and preserved by the Namibian government and some seminal work has been developed, materialized in a number of interesting publications, but we believe that there is still a lot of information to be extracted from this shipwreck.
Bom Jesus left Lisbon in early March 1533 bound for India in the fleet of D. João Pereira, which was composed of seven ships: D. João Pereira’s ship, name unknown, and the naus Santa Bárbara (captain Lourenço de Paiva), Santa Clara (captain Diogo Brandão), nau (or navio) Cirne (captain D. Gonçalo Coutinho), São Bartolomeu (capitain Nuno Furtado de Mendonça), São Roque (captain Simão da Veiga), and Bom Jesus (captain D. Francisco de Noronha).
It was excavated but not entirely published. Its wooden structure still needs to be recorded and published.
The timber clusters were designated St1, St2, and St3, and described summarily. There is no published inventory of the timbers. The papers of the excavation are not at the Centro Nacional de Arqueologia Nautica e Subaquatica (CNANS), according to their own information (pers. Comm. Adolfo Silveira Martins, 2025).
A figure in Alves’ report with what seems to be the collection of timbers and its organization in a tank (Alves 2009, p.34).
St1 is described as follows
One layer of ceiling planks 1.7 cm thick over the frames. Several of these planks were found lapped with a ‘l-shaped’ groove to allow for overlap. Alves mentions a photomosaic of these planks, but according to CNANS, it has disappeared.
One frame, St1FS1
One frame, broken, St1FS2.1 and St1F2.2
One frame, St1FS3
One frame, St1FS4
One frame, St1FS5
Hull planking, 9 cm thick, with lead strings between the seams. There is no information about the hull planking. It looks like there were six planks. There is no information about the outer surface of the hull planks, namely whether they have lead straps protecting the seams and in how may layers.
St2 is described as follows
Four frame timbers lying on the sediment (Alves 2009). The report mentions ceiling planking, and there is a picture on page 36:
There is a deck clamp on top of the frames.
There is no reference to hull planking
St3 is not described
There are no mentions to fasteners.
Table 1. Timber scantlings
No. | Description | Sided [cm] | Molded [cm] |
001 | Mast top. No position on the site plan. | ||
002 | St1FS1 | ||
003 | St1FS2.1 and St1FS2.2 | ||
004 | St1FS3 | ||
005 | St1FS4 | ||
006 | St1FS5 | ||
007 | Hull plank | ||
008 | Hull plank | ||
009 | Hull plank | ||
010 | St2 | ||
011 | St2 ceiling plank 1 | ||
012 | St2 ceiling plank 2 | ||
013 | St2 ceiling plank 3 | ||
014 | St2 ceiling plank 4 | ||
015 | St2 frame timber 1 | ||
016 | St2 frame timber 2 | ||
017 | St2 frame timber 3 | ||
018 | St2 frame timber 4 | ||
019 | Clamp |
Team
The site was found in April 2008 during mining operations and surveyed and reported by Namdeb archaeologist Dieter Noli. Its importance was immediately acknowledged by the mine administration and the Namibian government, and Dieter Noli invited Dutch/South African colleague Bruno Werz to assist with the excavation of the site. A Portuguese team – Francisco Alves and Miguel Aleluia – was trusted with the study of the ship remains and recorded a small portion of the timbers.
Ballast
The ballast pile was a large mound of pebbles but it was not measured, nor was its weight estimated.
Anchors
There were some anchors.
Guns
The exact number is not published yet.
Cargo
There were copper ingots with the fugger mark, and a large collection of artifacts that is not yet published.
Ivory tusks were found on site. Watch Judith Sealy, “Lost on the turn of the Cape of Good Hope” ArchSoc WC, 9 February 2021.
Iron Concretions
Iron concretions adhering to the rocky bottom were ubiquitous, sometimes easy to identify – as in the case of fasteners, swords, or muskets – and sometimes more difficult to interpret.
Hull remains
Part of the hull structure was preserved, but there is no final site plan and it is impossible to describe all the preserved structural elements.
Size and scantlings
The size of the Oranjemund shipwreck was not estimated. the scantlings measured are presented in the table below.
Caulking
A number of lead straps with tack holes were evident allover the site, with the typical shapes used to cover the timber’s seams, and some twisted lead strings were also present, suggesting the same type of caulking used on the 1606 Nossa Senhora dos Mártires.
Fasteners
All fasteners seemed to be iron spikes with square shanks, and bolts.
Wood
No samples were taken for dendrochronology or species identification.
Deliverables
Roff Smith from National Geographic published an article on this shipwreck, and Dieter Noli published a book – with Wolfgang Knabe – about this shipwreck and kept notes for a possible exhibition.
Francisco Alves and Bruno Werz also published a series of papers and reports, and a team of South African archaeologists coordinated by Shadreck Chirikure published an excellent paper on the material culture found on this site.
A number of videos and articles were published at the time of this archaeological find.
References
Alves, F., 2008. Relatório da participação do Governo Português (…) em Oranjemund, Namibia. Unpublished Report.
Alves, F., 2009. O navio português do século XVI de Oranjemund, Namíbia. Trabalhos da DANS, No. 45.
Alves, F., 2009. The 16th century Portuguese shipwreck of Oranjemund, Namíbia. Trabalhos da DANS, No. 45.
Alves, F., and Aleluia, M., Oranjemund shipwreck, namibia. The Portuguese participation in the 2nd field season excavation (August-September 2008). Documentos de Trabalho IGESPAR No. 1.
Chirikure, S., Sinamai, A., Goagoses, E., Mubusisi, M., and Ndoro, W., 2010. “Maritime Archaeology and Trans-Oceanic Trade: A Case Study of the Oranjemund Shipwreck Cargo, Namibia,” Journal of Maritime Archaeology, 5: 37-55.
Knabe, W., and Noli, D., 2012. Die Versunkenen Schatze der Bom Jesus. Berlin: Nicolai.
Pereira, J. Malhão, 2009. The Portuguese Wreck in Namibia. Some Nautical Comments. Unpublished Report.
Smith, R., 2009. “Shipwreck i the Forbidden Zone,” National Geographic Magazine, October.
Thomaz, L., 2014. Oranjemund Coins. Lisbon: Imprensa Nacional Casa da Moeda.
Werz, B., 2008. The Oranjemund Shipwreck Project. Phase 2 Excavation Report. Unpublished Report.
Werz, B., 2009. “The Oranjemund shipwreck, Namibia. The excavation of
sub-Saharan Africa’s oldest discovered wreck,” Journal of Namibian Studies 6: 81-106.
Werz, B., 2010. “Sub-Saharan Africa’s oldest shipwreck: historical-archaeological research of an early modern-era Portuguese merchantman on the Namibian coast,” Mariner’s Mirror, 96.4: 430-442.
Werz, B., 2015. “Saved from the sea: the shipwreck of the Portuguese merchant vessel the Bom Jesus (1533) and its material culture,” in A. Jordan Gschwend & K.J.P. Lowe (eds.) The Global City. On the streets of Renaissance Lisbon.London: Paul Holberton Publishing.