The Yorkshire coast has seen several towns and villages swallowed up by the sea due to coastal erosion. And, one Yorkshire town in particular that used to be more important than Hull has been discovered once more.
The town which was lost centuries ago has been found after decades of searching. The medieval port town of Ravenser Odd, or Ravensrodd is found in East Yorkshire along the Humber Estuary.
Before it was swept into the sea, the town was more important than Hull. The Daily Mirror reports that after decades of searching a team of scientists have finally found ‘Yorkshire’s Atlantis’.
New stoneworks and rocks have been found beneath the sea after scientists believe they’d been searching for Ravenser Odd town in the wrong place. After searching closer to the shore the town was found and is considered a breakthrough discovery.
The town was swallowed up by the sea 660 years ago, scientists previously believed it had been located a mile off the Yorkshire coast.
It was founded in the mid-13th century and had more than 100 houses and a set of warehouses for collecting cargo from docked ships. The market town was a flourishing area at the time.
But, due to shifting sandbank, the town was swept into the sea and storms over the winter of 1356 and 1357 saw it taken by the sea.
Speaking to The Sun, Professor Dan Parsons of the University of Hull said this discovery ‘could be on par with Pompeii’.
He continued: ‘It’s fascinating, exciting, exhilarating – the exact location of this medieval town hasn’t ever been pin-pointed.
‘We now have the tools and the technology to go out there and locate it once and for all’.
Coastal erosion is still rife in the area with the most recent East Yorkshire victims being Mappleton, which required emergency sea defences to protect the town from falling into the sea in the 1990s, and Spurn Point which was close to being demolished in 2013.
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