Treasures from the Hoi An Hoard

We currently have one of the largest single collections of medieval shipwreck pottery for sale within Australia. From a ship that sank circa 1480-90 AD off the coast of Vietnam, the recovery effort was one of the greatest underwater archaeological discoveries of all time.


One notable London dealer described ceramics from the Hoi An Hoard as "the most precious and complete representation of Vietnamese artisanship in glazed ceramics" and far more rare than their Chinese counterparts from Tek Sing.


The shipwreck was located in the middle of a typhoon zone known as the Dragon Sea. Recovering artifacts from the hoard required a team of divers to live in special pressurised chambers for weeks; the shipwreck was located at a depth of 70 metres which meant that this was the only way to avoid instant depressurisation and death. Each piece was carefully transferred topside to storage and desalination barges, where twelve washers were waiting to clean the pieces as soon as they came up.

This operation, in conjunction with the dives, involved 120 men, including archaeologists, photographers, artists and technical crew. While they worked they were guarded by the Vietnamese Navy, whose responsibility it was to keep pirates away. Not only was the military present, but twenty-four hour a day security guards were authorized to search all personnel and their carry-on bags.

In the end, pirates, typhoons and hazardous diving conditions could not prevent the operation from being a success. After desalination, the artifacts were sorted and tagged. They were then transferred to a warehouse outside Da Nang, where a workforce of over sixty continued cleaning, photographing, drawing and recording, preparing the porcelain for its final destination -- the outside world.

At 65,000 US dollars a day, the final cost of this entire expedition was four million USD.