Legend holds that in very ancient times alongside gold and silver, another precious metal was coveted and mined in Atlantis. That metal was called orichalcum, and researchers believe it was discovered in large quantities in a 2,600 year-old shipwreck off the coast of Sicily, as announced earlier this year.
The ship carrying the metal, which fits the description of orichalcum, sank off the coast of Gela near southern Sicily as it was coming into port. The wreck probably occurred as a result of the ship being caught in a storm.
“The wreck dates to the first half of the 6th century [B.C.],” said Sebastiano Tusa, Sicily’s superintendent of the Sea Office, according to Discovery News. “It was found about 1,000 feet from Gela’s coast at a depth of 10 feet.”
The ship probably was on its way from Greece or Asia Minor. Its cargo included 39 ingots (or rectangular bars, blocks, or bricks) of the precious metal. Orichalcum was considered a mysterious metal even in the days of Plato, who wrote about it in his “Critias Dialogue” in 360 B.C. By this time it was known only by name, not by sight.
