Don A. Frey, Institute of Nautical Archaeology

Anchors away. Barako argues that the Philistines journeyed to Canaan primarily by sea. But could ships dating to the time of the migration of the Sea Peoples have carried a mass of settlers as well as all their possessions? Yes, says Barako, judging by depictions of ancient ships, texts that deal with naval matters and the archaeology of ancient shipwrecks. For example, at the Late Bronze Age (c. 1306 B.C.) Uluburun shipwreck, off the Turkish coast, archaeologists have found an immense cargo of metallic “oxhide” ingots weighing a total of 10 tons. A contemporaneous text from Ugarit mentions a request for 450 metric tons of barley to be sent a distance of 110 miles, in only one or two trips by a single ship.