Word formation

When divers first located the merchant ship lying on its side in the silt of a northern estuary, few expected to find it in such 1. condition. The cold, oxygen-poor water at such a 2. had kept away the shipworm that destroys most wooden wrecks, so that even rope, leather and fragments of sailcloth had survived. Working on the site, however, is far from glamorous. 3. is rarely more than a metre, and divers spend much of their time mapping the wreck by touch, recording every object in its exact position before it is lifted, since information about where something lay is 4. lost once it has been moved. The 5. of waterlogged timber poses a further problem: allowed to dry out, it shrinks and cracks within days, so the hull timbers are now soaking in tanks of a wax-like solution, where they will remain for several years. Among the more 6. finds, which took the team completely by surprise, was a set of dice carved from animal bone. For many visitors to the temporary exhibition, however, the crew's personal belongings, from leather shoes to a child's wooden toy, are the most 7. part of the display. The team now hopes that tree-ring analysis of the timbers will allow the ship's construction to be dated with far greater 8..