WE’RE MINTED!
Detectorists unearth £150k hoard from the 1300s
‘My machine was like a Hoover’
TREASURE hunters have unearthed hundreds of rare gold and silver coins from the 14th century worth up to £150,000.
The discovery in a field by metal detecting enthusiasts started when their equipment led them to 12 ornately decorated silver Edward I and II coins.
The four men were delighted and then astonished as they dug deeper to find coin after coin. Over four days, they excavated 557 coins including 12 ultra-rare full gold nobles from the time of the Black Death which could be worth £10,000 each.
The treasure has been nicknamed the Hambleden Hoard after the village in Buckinghamshire where it was found.
It is believed to be the biggest gold haul dug up in Britain in nearly a decade and the largest collection of silver for 12 years.
The coins are being kept safe in a museum before being independently evaluated and sold with the proceeds split between the landowner and the finders.
The men – Andrew Winter, 38, brothers Tobiasz and Mateusz nowak, 30 and 33, and Dariusz Fijalkowski, 44 – have spoken to experts who estimate the value at £150,000.
The quartet had gone to a rally of metal detectorists near Hambleden, a village recorded in the Domesday Book of 1086.
Most had only found shotgun shells and bits of old iron before the four men struck lucky.
Mateusz nowak, a hospital cleaner from newcastle upon Tyne, said: ‘We were finding so much. It was a miracle moment after moment for everyone.’
His brother Tobiasz, a baker also from newcastle, added: ‘I can’t even imagine how we got so lucky.’ Mr Winter and the nowak brothers are friends who had gone together then teamed up with Mr Fijalkowski, a fatherof-three and machine operator from Bristol. He found two silver coins at around the same time as they turned over a clod of earth to reveal two coins with more in the hole.
Under detecting rules, anything over three coins is a hoard which has to be declared to organisers. The area was cleared and claimed jointly by the four. Mr Winter, a crane driver from Blyth, northumberland, said: ‘We just kept finding, finding, finding and digging and digging. My machine was like a Hoover.’
On the first day, the men found 276 silver coins and nine gold nobles, and admit they barely slept due to excitement.
The hoard grew to an eventual total of 545 silver coins plus fragments and 12 gold nobles.
The silver coins are believed to be from the reigns of Edward I and II (1272 to 1327). The gold ones were from Edward III’s reign between 1327 and 1377.
Mr Winter said the rarer silver coins could be worth around £500 each with the others likely to be valued at £20 to £50 each.
The nowak brothers and Mr Fijalkowski are of Polish origin but have lived in the UK for many years. The haul is the biggest set of gold since 52 coins from the 17th century were found in West Yorkshire in 2011.