The Kyrenia ship is the remains of a fourth-century BC Greek merchant sailing ship. It was discovered by Greek-Cypriot diving instructor Andreas Cariolou in November 1965. After losing its exact position, Cariolou made more than 200 dives until he found the wreck again in 1967.

Mikhail Katzev, a graduate student at the Museum of Archaeology and anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania, led the expedition in 1967-69. A British team of scientists from the University of Oxford, using a magnetometer and a metal detector, spent a month examining the location trying to find metal parts and the approximate position of the ship. During the summer diving periods of 1968 and 1969, an expedition consisting of more than 50 underwater archaeologists, students, and technicians used stereo photography and other available techniques to record the position of each object before it was brought to the surface. Then the wooden hull, well preserved on the muddy seafloor, was mapped, marked, and carefully raised in several parts to the surface.

A BBC documentary was released about the discovery. The ship was perfectly preserved. About 75% of its hull was in good condition. The sailboat was placed in the museum of ancient shipwrecks in the Kyrenian castle, where it can still be seen today.

Thanks to almost complete preservation, as well as a good reconstruction, our knowledge of ancient shipbuilding is supplemented by an irreplaceable example. The ship sailed in the Mediterranean during the lifetime of Alexander the great and his successors. It sank in open waters less than a mile from its anchorage in Kyrenia. The reason for its sinking was a storm. Although, after years of research, piracy is becoming an increasingly likely option for its demise. Typical merchant ships had devices for measuring the weight of goods. And on the found remains of a sailboat, all this was missing. Even more surprising is that there were missed more than a ton of cargo. This makes the researchers believe that the ship was looted. What further reveals this argument is the presence of a cursed mark on the wreckage. For example, robbers could drive it into the wooden part of the boat in the hope that the dark magic caused by the tablet would hide evidence of their crime. These facts taken together make many people believe that piracy played the main role in the sinking of the ship.