There are stories that remain buried in the depths of the sea, not just under tons of water, but also under a thick layer of secrets and litigation. The galleon San José left Cartagena de Indias (Colombia) on May 29, 1708, with tons of gold, silver, and precious stones that the Spanish had extracted from America. The destination was Cádiz, and the Bourbons were anxiously awaiting its arrival because the coffers were quite empty due to the War of Succession. The ship, with 600 crew members, never reached its destination: the British, who also coveted the gold and silver, were lying in wait and sank it near the Rosario Islands, in the Caribbean. The treasure, which is not documented, went to the bottom of the sea with all the crew and has since fueled a host of legends. Even Gabriel García Márquez mentions it in Love in the Time of Cholera.

We know many things about the Romans, because they left extensive documentation that mainly recounts their exploits, the intrigues of emperors, and the daily lives of ordinary mortals. A vast amount of archaeological evidence, both on land and at sea, has also uncovered everything they built and the technical advances they achieved. With bioarchaeology, it is even possible to know with precision what materials they used to make vessels as waterproof as possible and where they built and repaired them. And to delve into very specific details like those revealed by a new study published in Frontiers in Materials, with researchers from France and Croatia, which analyzes the coating of a Roman vessel (called Ilovik–Parzine 1), which sank approximately 2,200 years ago off the coast of what is now Croatia.