When hut conservators removed a "congealed mess" from Robert Falcon Scott's historic hut at Cape Evans in Antarctica, they had no inkling their find would turn out to be precious images of Ernest Shackleton's support party.
"We didn't think it was of any note," said the Antarctic Heritage Trust's executive director, Nigel Watson.
Only when conservators got to work on the small, wooden box of material at Scott Base did they discover they had stumbled upon a set of developed photographic negatives.
The cellulose nitrate film sheets were brought back to New Zealand last year, where photographic conservator Mark Strange began the painstaking task of separating and cleaning the sheets of film, removing mould and consolidating the image layers. Twenty-two images were recovered.
They are photographs taken by the Ross Sea party of Shackleton's 1914-17 Transantarctic Expedition. The explorer intended to make the first crossing of Antarctica, but instead his ship was crushed by ice in the Weddell Sea, leading to an epic of survival.