Who loves treasure? Most of us do - and what's better than finding hidden or lost treasure with low tech tools and cheap metal detectors?
I spent a few hours combing through lots of stories and found some great ones that I wanted to share. If you enjoy treasures or the hunt for them then read on and enjoy!
“Middleham Jewel”
This little treasure was discovered in Middleham Castle in North Yorkshire by Ted Seaton in September 1985. The story is unclear but it is said that Ted usually was out at the castle with his metal detector a lot until finally in September of that year he found and unearthed the gem. The jewel is an exquisitely engraved 15th century lozenge shaped gothic reliquary pendant, set with a large sapphire. Seaton's metal detector had picked up trace metal elements in the setting of the pendant. Shortly after being discovered, the jewel was sold at auction at Sotheby's in 1986 for the sum of 1.3 million pounds. It was also rumoured that a high ranking member of the Royal Family bought it.
A few years later, the jewel was once again up for sale and again it was sold - only this time it fetched 2.5 million pounds! Almost double then what it was originally sold for. The jewel would come up for auction again once more, but this time the Yorkshire Museum bought it and it can been seen there on public display to this day.
“Hoxne Hoard”
This treasure was a much larger find which was discovered by Eric Lawes on November 16, 1992 with his metal detector in the village of Hoxne in Suffolk. The hoard contained a cache of approximately 15,000 late 4th and early 5th century Roman silver and gold coins. They also discovered over 200 items of silver tableware and jewelery. After its discovery, it was declared a “Treasure Trove” (meaning you only get a really small percent of the value of the treasure) and it was purchased by the British Museum for an undisclosed amount. Several items from the hoard such as the famous Silver Tigress are on permanent display there. Eric Lawes and the landowner on who's land it was found received 1.75 million pounds, and they divided it evenly.
“17th Century Gold Coin”
Although this story doesn't involve mass quantities of gold and riches - never the less it still involves treasure and one ordinary person. On a sunny day in May 2004 in Overton, London, a novice treasure hunter named Richard Jones was out in a farmer's field with his metal detector. After a few hours of searching and coming up empty handed, he finally got a good signal on his detector. Thinking it was an old bottle cap or something, Jones was surprised to see he had found some kind of coin he had never seen before.
The coin was cleaned up a little bit and was finally dated between 1685 to 1688. After an additional analysis was conducted, the coin was found to have a gold content of approximately 90 percent. It was then declared a treasure by the North East Wales coroner John Hughes at an inquest at the Flint Magistrates court. After all was said and done and the coin had been declared treasure, no museum showed interest in the coin and it was finally returned to Jones.
“Hand of Faith”
Here's the story of some good fortune that happened to one lucky guy in Australia in 1980. Kevin Hillier from Wedderburn, Australia loved to take his metal detector out searching for objects whenever he had time. Although through the years Kevin had found many things, nothing would compare to what he would finally end up finding.
He was out one late afternoon searching the ground and so on when he got a good hit on his metal detector. Like many other people, Kevin didn't get overly excited because he knew from previous times they often turned out to be nails, old metal or bottle caps. After he started to unearth the area where the signal was coming from, to his surprise he saw gold. Thinking it was only a little nugget which wasn't that uncommon he tried to pull it out of the ground but with no luck. Kevin went on cleaning and digging out around the gold nugget. To everyone's surprise, when it was totally unearthed the gold nugget was amazingly huge - weighing in at 61 pounds total which at that time was worth around $425,000 US.
Shortly after this, the nugget got the name “Hand of Faith” and was the 4th largest gold nugget in the world and the largest known gold nugget on display. It would be sold once more, only this time the “Golden Nugget Casino” purchased it for the sum of $1,000,000 and put it on display in the North tower off their casino where it will probably remain for generations to come.
In Europe, the potential treasure could honestly be thousands of years old. In my opinion, metal detecting isn't so much a treasure hunt, but more of a history adventure. Time-capsules buried, hidden until its time for history to repeat itself.
Have A Blessed Day,
Nelson Doyle