Dutch To Return Shipwreck Relics To WA

Dutch to return shipwreck relics to WA

AAP
January 22, 2009

ALMOST 2000 items from the Batavia and other Dutch shipwrecks off the WA coast will return to the State under an agreement reached with the government of the Netherlands.

The artefacts, including a cannon, elephant tusk, amber, German stoneware, coins and porcelain from the 17th and 18th centuries are currently stored in the Netherlands.

The 1,326 artefacts and 633 coins will be relocated as close as possible to the West Australian shipwrecks - the Batavia, the Vergulde Draeck, the Zuytdorp and the Zeewyk.

``The Netherlands over the last four or five years has been getting a bit uncomfortable about having this collection,'' the WA Museum's head of maritime archaeology Jeremy Green told AAP today.

``It goes against the modern museum practice of keeping collections together.

``What they're concerned about is that they've got a collection that they can't really do much with.''

The federal government says the agreement will deliver the largest maritime endowment Australia has ever received.

``It's very significant from our point of view because ... it begins to make the collections more accessible nationally and internationally, for people to look at, study and do more research,'' Mr Green said.

While a committee is yet to decide where exactly the new collection will be held, Mr Green said it was not likely to be outside WA.

``It's fairly inconceivable that it would go anywhere else,'' he said.

The objects will be housed as close as possible to the shipwrecks they were taken from, the federal Heritage Minister Peter Garrett said today.

The Batavia was wrecked in 1629 on the Houtman Abrolhos islands situated off the coastal town of Geraldton.

The Vergulde Draeck is situated off Ledge Point, just north of Perth, the Zuytdorp went down on the coast between Kalbarri and Shark Bay, 871 km north of Perth, and the Zeewyk is in the Pelsart Group on the Abrolhos islands.