Notes

1. With contributions by O. Brinkkemper, F. van Deijk, W.M. Gijsbers, E.M. Jacobs, C. Joosten, M. Terhorst, A.D. Vos.

2. The remains of stationary fishing, both professional and recreational, were a constant nuisance. In July 1990 a mess of geotextiles or bigbag packing material was encountered. Although uncorroborated, there is reason to believe that this was related to an incident in which the site and its buoyed shot lines were used as a temporary repository for a shipment of drugs. A transport in an inflatable dinghy was intercepted by the border police and the use of temporary dumps was referred to in police investigation. The packing material had already been disposed of when this information reached the team. No damage had been done to the site.

3. Images of individual objects in the assemblage are accessible through the Beeldbank Cultureel Erfgoed (http://beeldbank.cultureelerfgoed.nl/alle-afbeeldingen/weergave/search/layout/result/indeling/gallery/start/60?searchfield=molengat accessed 30 August 2012).

4. The combination of the Maltese cross of the Teutonic order, the Polish (?) eagle and the spelling of Ilkus was first brought to our attention in 1992 by Dr Andrzej Zbierski, director of the National Maritime Museum in Gdànsk. Edgar Wróblewski helped us to locate and understand Polish (and Czech) references and historical analyses.

5. For this estimate the pack is divided into a main body and a fragment that is known to lie on top of lead ingots. The average dimensions of the main fragment are 17.0 by 6.88 by 0.60 m. The volume (70.125 m3) times the density (7860 kg/m3) gives a weight of 551182.5 kg. Together with the weight of the small fragment (3.35 x 2.15 x 0.30 m = 2.16 m3, times the density = 16938.495 kg), the total weight of wrought-iron bars is 568165.995 kg (568 tons).

6. The mandate of Ferdinand I (1503 –1564, King of Bohemia from 1526), issued on 12 April 1551 is kept in the Ferdinandeum of Tyrol Landesmuseum (Inv. no. FB6196). We are grateful to Ekkehard Westermann for helping us trace this information. The region marks in the present collections are generally variants of the marks in this mandate, but later marks, referring to Rudolf II (1552- 1612, King of Bohemia from 1575) also occur HyperlinkMandaat.

7. RA Leiden (NL), Archive 501A, inv. no. 187(B), f 223r. The year mark ‘in de Leeuw stellen’ (‘to be placed on the Lion’).

8. Sténuit refers to these objects as ’pewter' caps, as is customary in archaeological literature. His observation that lead content must be high supports the idea that the Lastdrager caps are lead as well.

9. ‘One man draws out the wire, another straights it, a third cuts it, a fourth points it, a fifth grinds it at the top for receiving the head; to make the head requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on, is a peculiar business, to whiten the pins is another; it is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper; and the important business of making a pin is, in this manner, divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, in some manufactories, are all performed by distinct hands, though in others the same man will sometimes perform two or three of them’ (Smith 1776, 5).

10. The X-ray research was conducted by the Rotterdamse Droogdok Maatschappij (RDM) in Rotterdam, with a SL69 MkIII linear accelerator for industrial radiography (MEL).

11. Amsterdam voet = 0.283 m; Amsterdam duim = 0.0257 m (Verhoeff 1983).