It’s haul mine!
Bulldozer driver unearths £175,000 of Roman coins... but colleagues on site won’t get a share
BULLDOZER driver Mark Copsey and several other workmen were levelling ground for a new hockey pitch when – clank – his digger hit something extraordinary.
It had taken the top off an ancient pot buried 3ft down – and out spilled 3,339 Roman coins which experts say could be worth up to £175,000.
At least one of Mr Copsey’s fellow workers came over to join in his excitement, thinking the whole team would share in the find. But it was Mr Copsey who packaged the coins in two plastic carrier bags and phoned local museums to report the discovery.
Now a coroner has declared the find to be a treasure trove – and while Mr Copsey is in line for half the value, his colleagues are entitled to nothing at all.
Coroner Tony Williams ruled at a hearing this week that Mr Copsey alone was involved in unearthing the hoard in Yeovil, Somerset, rejecting lorry driver Colin Parnell’s claim that it was a team discovery.
All the coins are silver apart from four which are brass, and are thought
‘Jumping on the bandwagon’
to have been buried around 270 AD.
Some carry depictions of an elephant and a hippopotamus, while others feature the heads of empresses and emperors, including Philip I, born in Syria of a Syrian father, around 204 AD.
They have yet to be officially valued but Mr Copsey could get £87,500 if estimates prove correct because he has to share the proceeds equally with landowners South Somerset District Council.
After the hearing, 44-year- old Mr Copsey, an unmarried contract JCB driver, said finding the coins was ‘ brilliant’ and described his colleague’s attempt to stake a claim to them as ‘jumping on the bandwagon’.
Describing how he found the coins, he recalled how he had looked behind him to check the ground – a routine health and safety check – when his eye was drawn to a strange green patch in the soil, possibly where the silver had reacted to its surrounds.
‘I was stripping subsoil. I stopped my machine and got out and investigated and discovered a broken pot with some sort of coins.
‘The ’dozer took the top off the pot before I knew it was there – I’m afraid it’ll do that every time.
‘I’m still working on archaeological digs with the ’dozers so hopefully I might find some more coins.’
Mr Copsey added: ‘When I found the hoard I did everything I could to act correctly and do everything above board.’
The coins were found in 2013 but full details emerged only on Wednesday at the inquest in Taunton.
Archaeologists later discovered the hoard was buried on the edge of a small settlement which had lain unknown under Yeovil Recreation Ground. South West Heritage Trust would like to buy them for display at the Museum of Somerset after they have been valued independently.
Steve Minnitt, the trust’s head of museums, said: ‘Mr Copsey acted absolutely correctly, reporting the discovery immediately enabling a proper archaeological investigation which means we have much more information about the find.’
Yesterday coin expert Chris Martin of CJ Martin Limited in London, a certified dealer under the British Numismatic Trade Association, said early to mid-third century Roman coins similar those in the hoard could be worth between £10 and £100 each, meaning Mr Copsey’s windfall could be even greater than anticipated.