In 1982, a Turkish sponge diver spotted strange shapes on the Mediterranean seafloor that looked like giant metal biscuits with ears. Those biscuits led to one of the most monumental archaeological discoveries of the 20th century, a wooden ship that sank in the late 14th century BCE.

This episode explores the Uluburun shipwreck, a breathtaking snapshot of a thriving Late Bronze Age trade network. With cargo from nine or ten distinct cultures, it shatters the illusion of an isolated ancient world and reveals an era of standardized industry, royal gift-giving, and multicultural crews moving wealth across the open sea.

• The recovery took 11 campaigns and 22,413 individual dives between 1984 and 1994, with divers limited to about 20 minutes a day at depths past 170 feet
• The cargo held 10 tons of Cypriot copper and one ton of t ...