QINGDAO, Oct. 22 (Xinhua) -- The wreckage of a massive warship has been discovered off the coast of east China's Qingdao City some 100 years after it sank in a World War I battle, the municipal culture and tourism bureau said on Thursday.

Over 100 pieces of relics were also found in the peripheral waters of the Jiaozhou Gulf along with the shipwreck, including bullets, valves of water pipes, leather shoe-pads, and coal briquettes.

The massive shipwreck ruins were discovered as a result of research from Aug. 5 to Sept. 23, carried out by the national cultural relics bureau and Shandong provincial and Qingdao municipal archaeological institutes.

As the sunken ship is still mostly buried in the seabed and waiting to be excavated, its owner and history are yet to be confirmed by researchers, but documentary records indicate that the ship fell victim to a naval battle between Japan and Germany near the gulf.

Researchers said the discovery would provide significant evidence to the study of military strengths and cultures during WWI.

Archaeologists also found another three sites of underwater relic ruins in the Jiaozhou Gulf, possibly a sunken warship dating back to WWI. Enditem

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