While digging a trench for a light-and-sound show at Fort St. Angelo in Kannur, India, workers discovered more than 35,000 cannonballs in what experts are calling the one of the largest caches of such ammunition ever discovered at a single archaeological site.

According to Archaeology and The Times of India, laborers were digging trenches for electricity cables when they first spotted the first of the cannonballs on December 10. Ultimately, a total of 35,950 cannonballs were discovered, including roughly 5,300 of them on Sunday alone.

The excavation, which was conducted by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), reported that the artillery was spread across four different pits. The task, archaeologist T Sreelakshmi noted, is now to preserve the cannonballs by chemically treating them.

Sreelakshmi added that ASI is “not sure whether such a huge stock has ever been unearthed from anywhere in the world,” and that they planned to check historical records “to find out why such a huge quantity was dumped in the pits, thus making sure it would not be reused.”

Currently unknown which country the ammunition belonged to

The archaeologists warned that chemical treatment could take several weeks, and that they would be unable to reveal anything about the ammunition’s history until the process was completed. No further excavations are planned for the time being, said ASI archaeologist C Kumaran.

Fort St. Angelo is located southern India on the coast of the Arabian Sea, and Archaeology noted that it was originally constructed by the Portuguese in 1505. It was later captured by the Dutch in 1663, told to king Ali Raja of Arakkal in 1772, and seized by the British in 1790. It was last used in 1947 and is now considered to be a protected monument under the auspices of the ASI.

Archaeologists have also repaired seaward-facing cannons previously fixed in the bastions of the fort walls that were previously used by the Portuguese and the British, according to International Business Times. It is currently unclear if the newfound cannonballs belonged to the Portuguese, the Dutch, or the British. They should know more once the dating process is complete.

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Feature Image: Thinkstock

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