At least 10 Native American canoes have been found in Wisconsin’s Lake Mendota, the oldest of which may be up to 4,500 years old.
The cache of boats was recently discovered by marine archaeologists from the Wisconsin Historical Society together with members of the Ho-Chunk Nation.
Two canoes were first found in 2021 and 2022, but subsequent dives showed the lake was hiding even more artifacts. They’ve now identified a total of 10 unique canoes, although they’re currently studying an ambiguous bunch of submerged wood that could bring that total up to 11.
“What we thought at first was an isolated discovery in Lake Mendota has evolved into a significant archaeological site with much to tell us about the people who lived and thrived in this area over thousands of years and also provides new evidence for major environmental shifts over time,” Dr Amy Rosebrough, State Archaeologist for the Wisconsin Historical Society, said in a statement.
Experts work together to clean a 3,000-year-old dugout canoe recovered from Lake Mendota in 2022.
Image credit: Dean Witter/Wisconsin Historical Society
Radiocarbon dating and wood type analysis suggest the oldest dugout canoe was built around 2500 BCE using elm. This officially makes it the oldest boat of its kind ever found in the Great Lakes region.
The relics were all found along a 240-meter (800-foot) strip that was likely once shoreline that has since become submerged due to environmental shifts in the region.
“Seeing these canoes with one’s own eyes is a powerful experience, and they serve as a physical representation of what we know from extensive oral traditions that Native scholars have passed down over generations,” said Bill Quackenbush, Tribal Historic Preservation Officer for the Ho-Chunk Nation.
Underwater image of a dugout canoe from Lake Mendota taken in 2021.
Image credit: Tamara Thomsen/Wisconsin Historical Society
“We are excited to learn all we can from this site using the technology and tools available to us, and to continue to share the enduring stories and ingenuity of our ancestors,” explained Quackenbush.
Together with Tribal Historic Preservation Officers, the Wisconsin Historical Society have decided to not recover any more submerged canoes due to their fragile condition.
However, the two canoes recovered in 2021 and 2022 were retrieved and are currently undergoing a preservation process at the State Archive Preservation Facility in Madison. This arduous process won’t be finished until 2026.
Equally amazing discoveries of this kind have been made elsewhere in the US. Two boaters stumbled across a huge Native American canoe buried in the mud while sailing down the Red River of Louisiana in 2017.
Measuring around 10.2 meters (33 feet) in length and 90 centimeters (3 feet) in width, the vessel was fashioned from a single hollowed tree trunk. This is an ancient style of boat construction that’s been found around the world, from the Americas and Oceania to Africa and Eurasia.
