Salma Ouaguira
Tue 22 October 2024
The 11th-century coin trove is known as the Chew Valley Hoard (British Museum/PA Wire)
A group of metal detectorists uncovered an extraordinary hoard of 2,584 ancient coins in a Somerset field valued at £4.3million.
The 11th-century coin trove, known as the Chew Valley Hoard, is now England’s most valuable treasure find, revealing new information about the historical transition following the Norman Conquest.
The set includes pennies depicting William the Conqueror and Harold II, and a number of coins of William I issued after his coronation in 1066.
Adam Staples, 48, discovered the coins in 2019 with his girlfriend at the time, Lisa Grace, and five friends, but had to wait for years to secure the payout.
The set includes pennies depicting William the Conqueror, Harold II and William I (British Museum/PA Wire)
Under the Treasure Act 1996, hunters must report an archaeological find to the local coroner within 14 days of discovering it.
The auctioneer from Derby said: “It’s like winning the lottery but then you can’t cash the ticket for five years.
“Coming to the British Museum a few days after we found the hoard, when they opened the front gates and we drove through crowds with a few million pounds worth of coins in the back of the car, was a surreal experience.
“And then it was Covid and five years of silence until we got to this point. It’s frustrating, but it’s still winning the lottery, so you feel like you can’t complain.
“We received the money a few weeks ago – I’ve bought a house and can now live mortgage-free.”
The collection shines fresh light on the aftermath of the Norman invasion, covering the transition from Saxon to Norman rule marked by 1066 (British Museum/PA Wire)
Half of the money went to the landowner, and the rest was split between the members of the treasure-hunting group, meaning they got around £300,000 each.
Despite hitting the jackpot, Mr Staples is continuing to hunt for treasure, having last gone detecting on Sunday.
Experts believe the coins provide valuable insights into the economic conditions during the period following the Battle of Hastings. They suggest the coins were buried for safekeeping amid the unrest at the time.
Gareth Williams, a curator at the British Museum, said the original owner was likely affluent and possibly involved in the conflicts during the Norman invasion.
An Edward the Confessor Pyramid coin (1065-6), which is part of the Chew Valley Hoard of 2,584 coins (AP)
Evidence showed whoever buried the trove was “involved in some way in the Battle of Hastings”, he added. The hoard would have bought a flock of more than 500 sheep, he said, and so it must have belonged to “someone relatively wealthy”.
That person “may or not” have come to an unpleasant end, Mr Williams added.
Coins in the 1,000-year-old hoard show signs of being illicitly tampered with, having mixed designs on either side. Experts said this is evidence that the person striking the coins was avoiding paying a fee to obtain an up-to-date design.
Mr Williams said that making false coinage risked a severe penalty – having a hand cut off – at the time. “We can see from these coins that that wasn’t a deterrent,” he added.
The hoard has been acquired by the South West Heritage Trust, following funding received from the National Lottery Heritage Fund and other organisations which paid Mr Staples for the coins.
It will be displayed at the British Museum from 26 November, before touring other museums across the country and eventually finding a permanent home in Somerset.
Hoard of 1,000-year-old coins unearthed in a farmer's field sells for $5.6 million
JILL LAWLESS
Tue 22 October 2024
An Edward the Confessor Pyramid coin (1065-6), part of the Chew Valley Hoard of 2,584 coins, buried in the turmoil following the Norman Invasion of Britain in 1066, on display at the British Museum in London, Tuesday, Oct. 22, 2024, the hoard is valued at £4.3 million pounds, (US$5.58 million), a record find. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)
LONDON (AP) — Adam Staples knew he’d found something when his metal detector let out a beep. And then another. And another.
Soon “it was just ‘beep beep, beep beep, beep beep,’” Staples said.
In a farmer’s field in southwest England, Staples and six friends had found a hoard of more than 2,500 silver coins that had lain in the ground for almost 1,000 years. Valued at 4.3 million pounds ($5.6 million) and now bound for a museum, they will help shed light on the turbulent aftermath of the Norman conquest of England.
“The first one was a William the Conqueror coin — 1,000 pounds, 1,500 pounds value,” Staples said Tuesday at the British Museum, where the hoard will go on display in November. “It’s a really good find. It’s a find-of-the-year sort of discovery. And then we got another one, (we thought) there might be five, there might be 10.
“And it just got bigger and bigger," he said — the biggest find in his 30 years of searching the fields and furrows of Britain as an amateur detectorist.
The hoard, discovered in 2019 and recently acquired by the South West Heritage Trust, totaled 2,584 silver pennies minted between 1066 and 1068, some showing conquering King William I and others his defeated Anglo-Saxon predecessor Harold II.
Michael Lewis, head of the Portable Antiquities Scheme — a government-funded project that records archaeological discoveries made by the public – said it is “one of the most spectacular discoveries” of recent years, especially because “its story is yet to be fully unraveled.”
Lewis said the coin hoard will help deepen understanding of the most famous date in English history: 1066, the year William, Duke of Normandy, defeated King Harold at the Battle of Hastings, replacing England’s Saxon monarchs with Norman French rulers.
“Most of us are taught about the Norman Conquest of England at school, probably because it was the last time that England was successfully conquered,” Lewis said. “But it a story based on certain myths,” such as the notion that the battle pitted “English versus French,” or “good” Saxons against “bad” Normans.
In fact, the warring families were interrelated, and Lewis said the hoard “helps us to tell a different story, one that is more nuanced.”
Though the invasion marked a historic schism, the coins in the hoard are remarkably similar whether they were minted before or after the conquest. One side shows a monarch’s head in profile, the other an emblem: an elaborate cross for William, the somewhat ironic word “pax” -- peace -- for Harold.
Amal Khreisheh, curator of archaeology at the South West Heritage Trust, said the coins were likely buried for safekeeping as local rebellions erupted against Norman rule.
“We know that the people of Exeter rebelled against William in 1068 and that Harold’s sons, who were in exile in Ireland, came back and started mounting attacks along the River Avon down into Somerset,” she said. “So it’s probably against that background they were hidden.”
The Chew Valley Hoard, named for the rural area where it was found, has been bought for the nation with money from the charitable arm of Britain’s national lottery. After going on display at the British Museum and other museums around the U.K., it will have a permanent home at the Museum of Somerset in Taunton, 130 miles (210 kilometers) southwest of London.
It has taken several years for the hoard to make its way through Britain’s system for handling amateur archaeological finds. The Treasure Act decrees that anyone who finds historic gold, silver or other precious items must inform the local coroner. If a coroner declares it treasure, the hoard will belong to the government, and museums can bid for funding to acquire it.
An expert committee sets a value on each find, with the money divided between the owner of the land and the finders. In this case, Staples and six fellow detectorists split half of the 4.3 million pound purse.
“It’s like winning the lottery,” said Staples, who plans to continue his treasure-hunting hobby. “I’m not going to give up now. I love it.”
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