Treasure Hunting
Many people now follow the hobby of metal detecting.
Success depends on proper research but you may get lucky and find a hoard of coins.
Success depends on proper research but you may get lucky and find a hoard of coins.
Here is a video thanks to Youtube and Whites Electronics
The British Government publishes accounts of buried treasure
found and this make fascinating (if lengthy) reading.
found and this make fascinating (if lengthy) reading.
Here is the url for anyone interested
A number of years reports are available and it looks from those that the practice of hoarding wealth was widespread from pre-roman times right up to the present day.
Apart from the obvious distrust we all have of any government it seems that many hoards were hidden just before battles or in expectation of an invasion.
Hoards fascinate me as they really bring me in touch with a human being from long ago.
Was it an irish trader who buried his silver before the vikings rowed up the Kenmare river to sack the settlement and burn the Church ...
Or was it a highwayman who hid his collections on Hampstead Heath in London.
We will never really know the answers of course but every museum in Britain and Ireland has a small (or sometimes large ) collection of silver and gold found either by chance digging or a metal detctorist
in their area.
in their area.
Gold has the amazing ability to pass buried for hundreds or even thousands of years and emerge unscathed.
Tresaure from Shipwrecks finds silver coins welded together by crrosion from the sea but the gold again emerges good as new.
When I went treasure hunting some years ago I quickly learned that where there is one lost or hidden coin another is almost certain to be nearby.
That is because either it is a convenient and easily identifiable place to hide valuables or it may be a place where a traveler is liable to slip - for instance on a hill or at the entrance to a ford through a river or stream.
Many Treasure Hunters look at Government records first to see what has already been found. Then the area to search is narrowed down.
A good place to start treasure hunting is an ordnance survey map .
The ones pre-1900 are best as these have the old place names.
What you should lok for is place names similar to Moneybury Hill or Silver Field.
Look for lost villages or buildings that no longer exist.
A good hint is that in Britain the word temple in a place name generally
meant that the Knights Templar were associated with that place and they really did hide lots of things ...
(That is not true in Ireland though - temple usually meant that the town or village had a church )
Good luck with the treasure hunting .
The ones pre-1900 are best as these have the old place names.
What you should lok for is place names similar to Moneybury Hill or Silver Field.
Look for lost villages or buildings that no longer exist.
A good hint is that in Britain the word temple in a place name generally
meant that the Knights Templar were associated with that place and they really did hide lots of things ...
(That is not true in Ireland though - temple usually meant that the town or village had a church )
Good luck with the treasure hunting .