History of "Message in a Bottle"

"Message in a Bottle" Organization was born in 1989 thanks to the idea of Mario Palmieri, who is shipwright and sailor as well. He created a little shipyard and an historical naval architecture's workshop.
In 1999 his enterprise was included with the "Museo Archeologico Municipale" of Santa Marinella and so it became the first Italian Experimental Naval Architecture's Workshop interested in pre-medieval age.
From then on, Message in a Bottle had kept gathering all technical information about naval architecture coming from excavations and Egyptian, Phoenician, Punic, Greek, Etruscan and Roman wrecks and excavations.
Thanks to his experience and his manual ability, Palmieri reproduced some real-sized details of (ancient) hull's assemblage techniques, so that he could discover very advanced and new manufacture technology which was worth studying and making known.
After those discoveries, he decided to create the first Italian museum which studies (in depth) archaeological naval technology.

As years went by this workshop became a leader on a national scale for the ancient naval structural development's study and understanding. It received rave reviews from the regional government of Lazio: it was declared as the better museum of the Region in 2007-2008-2009. His works have been showed on specialized reviews, on scientific television programmes ("Superquark", "Linea Blu", etc.), national and international exhibitions ("Il Vittoriano", "Nautical showroom" in Rome, University of Corté).

Captain Mario Palmieri

In the last years "Message in a bottle" has supported universities, archaeological excavations, marine research's institutes, museums; now it collaborates above all with the French CNRS of Marseille and the University of Aix-en-Provence.
On the basis of several technical and scientific evaluations and fragmentary archaeological indications, Message in a Bottle also reproduced ancient naval hydraulic machines (wooden bilge's pumps with plunger or water-wheel of the I and II century B.C.); in addition, "Message in a bottle" has studied and has given detailed examples of the complex archaic special lacing techniques by proper didactic reconstructions.
In 2006 the Organization also bought a canadian schooner ("L'Antonio II") with which, as well as pleasure activities, it carries out archaeological-underwater research projects (like "Leucotea" project); moreover, with his schooner the enterprise is involved in the observation of protected animal species cooperating with the Faculty of Sea Biology.
Recently "L'Antonio II" has been involved in four important scientific projects of our Organization:

• Research into the raising of Mediterranean Sea level over the centuries with the "Vulcanology and Earthquakes Centre" and the "Sea Studies Centre" of the "Museo del Mare" of Santa Marinella.
• Geomorphologic and archaeological monitoring of Northern Lazio's coast depth with the University of Tuscia (Faculty of Oceanography) and the "Museo del Mare" of Santa Marinella.
• Underwater archaeology research and training with the "Museo del Mare e della Navigazione antica" (it is being carried out).
• A pilot scheme for social reintegration and job introduction of problematic youth through marine activities.