![]() “I thought to myself, if I couldn’t see any rams due to COVID, maybe I could make my own,” he said. Christopher Dostal, director of the Texas A&M University Conservation Research Laboratory ( CRL) and the Center for Maritime Archaeology and Conservation ( CMAC), DeCasien was learning about casting techniques and ways to conserve metal objects. Then in spring 2021, in a class led by Dr. ![]() ![]() It was a sorely missed opportunity and he didn’t forget it. Unfortunately for the New Jersey native, the invitation to the historic site came in fall 2019 before he could get to Sicily, the worldwide pandemic began and travel became impossible. One of DeCasien’s research interests, naval rams are ancient bronze weapons that were fitted to the bows of Greek and Roman warships and used to ram holes into the hulls of enemy ships. The site off the coast of western Sicily is the only known ancient naval battlefield ever discovered - nautical archaeologists have recovered 26 Roman and Carthaginian naval rams and other artifacts from a battle on the Mediterranean Sea that took place in 241 BCE during the First Punic War. When nautical archaeology graduate student Stephen DeCasien was invited by a colleague to be part of the Battle of the Egadi Islands Project, he was ecstatic.
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