On the afternoon of Aug. 10, 1628, the Vasa, built by the Swedish to be one of the most powerful warships in the Baltic, set off from the palace docks in Stockholm.
The Vasa did not even make it one mile.
A strong gust of wind caused the 226-foot-long ship to keel over as water poured in through its open gun ports, which were on display for its maiden voyage.
About 150 people were believed to be on board when it sank; about 30 died.
Now, nearly 400 years later, advanced DNA testing is allowing researchers to learn more about the ship’s dead, including a woman known as “G,” whom researchers had long believed to be a man. They even named her “Gustav” in a museum display.
“It’s fascinating to get a sense of who they are as individuals, but also what they tell us about what the Swedish population was like 400 years ago,” said Fred Hocker, the director of the Vasa Museum in Stockholm, where the ship is now displayed in its entirety.
The Vasa’s resurrection began in 1958 and was completed in 1961 when the entire warship was lifted from the depths of Stockholm harbor.
Workers sprayed the ship with water, then applied the preserving agent polyethylene glycol over the course of 17 years and let it dry for another nine years. The mud from the seafloor, it turned out, had kept the ship in remarkable condition.
A handful of similar excavation projects of historic ships were underway around the same time, Dr. Hocker said. But the Vasa, he said, “is the most spectacular.”
“It’s a whole ship — it’s huge!” he said. “The Vasa established the mold for what maritime archaeology could be.”
