Sailing on after seven centuries of oblivion

Helsingin Sanomat came the other day, to see us and our work. It's the biggest newspaper in Finland and our morning paper definitely. So it's a biggie, them coming to Tallinn to do a story about our shipwreck thingie.

What's this medieval Hanseatic ship and how come we're here and how we came to be Estonian e-citizens and runners of an OÜ? It's a story well worth telling, surely.

It was a chilly Friday morning when we walked to Seaplane Harbor from our nearby Airbnb. I photographed the crumbly frozen pond in front of the tent in which the ship winters, the same spot I had photographed a few months ago. At that time the illustration of the wreck on the tent's tarmac reflected beautifully on the brownish water. Now it was a grey and white icey wintery pond, no reflection.

Documenting the time's passing here too, in our worksite.

Then Kaja Kunnas walked from the parking lot. She's the journalist, the Baltic correspondent of the newspaper. Along came the photographer Marko Mumm.

Welcome, we've been waiting for this.

Heikki had come a day ahead to prepare and plan things with our Estonian Maritime Museum colleagues, of whom Lisette was there that day. Priit not, but he'd given his thoughts by phone a few days earlier. Good to have his voice in the piece as well, him being the primal archaeologist here together with Lisette.

Us? We're the conservators and that's what we talked about with Kaja. But not only about the ship and materials preservation but also about why this is done, what's the story actually?

It's a story in which we play a part as well, with our cultural, professional and emotional backgrounds and with our e-recidencies, all of it.

Where to start? Maybe from small details, from which humanity emerges, we thought. Shoes! Yes, let's start by looking at those, and other finds from the ship Lisette had prepared for the occasion on the tables of the office building they tenderly call 'kuut'.

Objects on a table, things, stuff. Shoes, spoons, a compass, some textile even. Miracles, in a way. They shouldn't be here, no, not really. Leather decomposes, as does wood, and textiles definitely. They don't come to us that old and so well preserved, not usually, because the normal natural decomposition reactions do their deeds and transform humanmade objects to something that returns to the cycle of life.

The ship¨s compass. Kaja Kunnas at the back. Photo: Eero Ehanti

And it doesn't happen the same way everywhere, we discussed at one point. Estonian soil for instance is more alkaline compared to Finnish soil, which is why organics preserve better here on the Southern shore of the Bay of Finland.

Anyway, organics decompose and metals corrode. That's how it is, the cycle of life goes on and on, rolls away in its destined eternal pace. Materials want to relax, they want to free their energy for others to flourish, wood wants to return to soil from which it once sprouted and metals to ores from which they were forced to metallic form.

What's there to do to stop this cycle which is as old as humanity and even older, going back to the dawn of the world as we know it? Not much, but that not much is what conservation is about. We do our best to halt those processes, so that we can keep those thingies as things, humanmade somethings.

The conserved shoes on the table are beautiful, with pointy shapes. ‘Stylish!’, said Kaja. Yes,they're kinda dandyish. How about that smaller, elegant one? Was there a woman onboard? Or perhaps a young boy? A crew member? Or just traveling to places? Who was this person?

The day went on, we stepped out of the office, walking and talking and then tramping on the ship, climbing on it, feeling her. She can take it, us walking on her, the wood she’s made of is amazingly well preserved, those huge oak planks. The trees they were made of must have been huge, back then in 1374, when they were felled according to dendrochronological analysis.

I was afraid our guests would slip because that morning the oak-planks were icy, the weather being below zero. Frozen ice on it. Damn that condensation!

Carefully there, I thought, when Kaja walked onboard, and Marko too, who climbed to highest spots to catch good photos of us explaining things and showing details. I much appreciate the effort for good shots.

'Is it moving, is there a surge of waves underneath?', Kaja asked when steadying herself onboard for the first time. Yes, I feel it too, often when pausing for a while to feel the ship and take in the moment I'm experiencing with this ancient ship.

Of course they climbed onboard. They had to! There's no way we could let anybody do a story about this without climbing onboard.

Conservation is also about accessibility and facilitating use of objects, whatever that might be, the use. Perhaps it's something we can't even think of, figure out, just yet? Hope so, because we're here only for a short while and now that's our watch, we must make sure to find uses for the things in our care while simultaneously ensuring that they'll be available for future use as well, for and by those who come after us.

Use. I so hate the word. In this context, and perhaps everywhere. It carries the implication of using one-sidedly, perhaps unjustly. Unfairly. Using. Taking advantage.

Are we doing that? Taking advantage of something? This ship, the Lootsi ship?

No, she's getting something as well.

When Heikki was neutralizing one of the exposed iron rudder fixtures with sodium carbonate, to wipe those tears of weeping corrosion away from the ship's most vulnerable spots, Kaja asked:’ why is she crying? For what? Is it suffering, is it joy?’

Good question. How is she doing? Suffering, yes, in a way. Corrosion, of the ferrous forms. But maybe it's tears of joy after all? Because we're here and doing this?

'She's happy because she's getting all that fish oil!', said Heikki, who was just brushing that on the iron, fish oil. Yet another layer on freshly neutralized iron surface.

Another layer of fish oil. Photo: Eero Ehanti

Will it do the trick, stabilize the iron, enough to stop the corrosion cycle? I should think so. But we'll see. And if not, we'll figure out something else, come up with another solution.

Are we using this ship, or paving the way for her misuse? I shouldn't think so. What would be a better life for her, now that she's been unearthed from her underground rest after some 650 years of oblivion? What would be better than this, for her and for us, who are here to help her to sail on in her amazing journey through centuries?

Marko Mumm, Kaja Kunnas, Heikki Häyhä and Eero Ehanti. Photo: Lisette Reinvars

Tallinn Bay opens right behind the museum and the tent. We looked at the big ferries entering the port. Those big ships, they're in the same story too, because it's the same bay and port where our Cog-ship docked in 1300s, lowered its single big square sail.

The shape of the sail and the hull of these ships are familiar from Hanseatic seals for instance. That's where such ships were known from, seals and other illustrations, until the discoveries of true surviving ships such as these ones in Tallinn.

The seal of Stralsund, 1329. Image: Wikimedia Commons Public Domain

And it's the same bay I look at from the other side on my morning runs in this second hometown of mine. It's there, on that side, by the coast road towards Pirita, where this ship was found. Now there's a new fancy office building called Koge Maja.

Seas don't separate, they connect. It's through seaways people, goods and ideas have moved since forever and they still do. Imagine a world without cargo-ship transports? And imagine the effects of the Suez-canal closing, what would be the effect, globally?

The story goes on, the Lootsi ship sails on.

Thanks for visiting Kaja and Marko, it was a pleasure!