Who Will Claim The San Jose's £16bn Treasure? 'World's Richest Shipwreck' Found In Caribbean

Three centuries since the San Jose sank to the bottom of the ocean, researchers believe they have identified the 'world's richest shipwreck' in the Caribbean sea, sparking questions around which country should claim the wreck's £16bn fortune.

New high resolution images of artefacts down in the Caribbean's depths are the clearest evidence so far that the shipwreck is indeed the San Jose.

The discovery has caused an international dispute about who can actually lay claim to the Spanish galleon's treasures which include gold, silver and emerald.

300-Year-Old Treasure Trove

The San Jose was the flagship of a treasure fleet on its way to finance Spain in the War of the Spanish Succession. It was intercepted on its way from Peru to Spain by the British Navy, and sunk off the Columbian coast.

Powder magazines exploded during the battle, sending nearly all 600 crew and its riches to the bottom of the sea.

Three centuries later, researchers have found and identified the wreckage as the Spanish galleon, along with gemstones and precious metals worth billions.

Who Actually Owns The Ship?

Although originally owned by Spain at the time of sinking, multiple countries are trying to stake their claim in the wreckage.

Spain considers the San Jose a state ship, and it currently remains an underwater graveyard that can't be commercially exploited.

Columbia, however, wants Spain to renounce its claim due to the wreckage being located in Columbia waters.

'If Spain, in this case, renounces its sovereign immunity, there will be no state or treasure-hunting company that does not invoke this precedent,' says lawyer and underwater heritage expert Jose Maria Lancho as Columbian law favours treasure hunters.

Several indigenous groups have also made a case for ownership of the wreckage, claiming the treasure was stolen from them. The Killakas, Carangas and Chichas peoples believe their ancestors extracted metals that made up half of the ship's cargo.

The indigenous communities wrote a letter to UNESCO and Spain last year which Reuters reported as saying, 'Our native communities consider any act of intervention and unilateral appropriation of the galleon, without consulting us directly and without expressly and effectively considering its common and shared character, to be an act of plunder and neo-colonialism.'

US-based salvage company Sea Search Armada has also made a claim to the ship since it supposedly discovered the wreckage over 40 years ago.

New Evidence Confirms Wreckage Is San Jose

The shipwreck suspected to be the San Jose was identified by the Columbian Navy in 2015. However, only recently have researchers been able to confirm it as the Spanish galleon.

New sophisticated sonar imagery has identified bronze cannons, weapons, ceramics, gold and other artefacts among the ship's cargo.

The gold is of particular interest to researchers, with a number of gold coins on the seafloor analysed in close detail. Lead researcher Daniela Vargas Ariza explained that coins are crucial for 'dating and material culture, particularly in shipwreck contexts.'

Identified features on the coins include the Jerusalem Cross which has helped researchers understand the ship's function and events around its sinking.

With the wreckage now confirmed as the San Jose, the international feud over the ship's ownership will almost certainly be heightened as countries vie for the £16bn worth of treasure.

Originally published on IBTimes UK