The Anglo-Saxons, a large cultural group that migrated from the North Sea coast, arrived and settled in England in the early Middle Ages (5th century AD). Their identity was formed by the fusion between migrating Germanic tribes and native British groups. In fact, it was the Anglo-Saxons who founded the United Kingdom and the English language is largely spoken today. Recently, the Evening Standard reported that a huge hoard of Anglo-Saxon gold coins, totaling 131 coins and four other gold objects, was found in west Norfolk, England, dating back to around 1,400 AD. last year.
One of the gold coins found by an anonymous discoverer. (Norfolk Recording and Identification Service)
Norfolk’s Anglo-Saxon Gold Coin Archive, Great Britain’s Largest Ever Archive!
Gareth Williams, curator of medieval coins at the British Museum, said the “extremely important discovery” dated to the same time as the burial of the ship Sutton Hoo (which would be the early 600s AD). AD) near Woodbridge in Suffolk.
“It dates from close to the famous ship burial of Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, and although it does not contain as much gold as the entire Sutton Hoo grave, it does contain more coins. In fact, this is the largest coin hoard of the known period. It must be seen alongside other recent finds from East Anglia and elsewhere, and will help transform our understanding of the economy of early Anglo-Saxon England,” Williams said. told The National UK.
Many of the coins in the Anglo-Saxon gold coin deposit in Norfolk were minted by the Merovingian dynasty, like this coin issued by Chlothar II from 584–628 AD. (PHGCOM/Public Domain)
Area coroner, Yvonne Blake, said that the coins were scattered over a wide area possibly due to plowing and were discovered by the same anonymous metal detectorist between 2014 and 2020 He added that some of the coins had been struck with the same die. As reported by the Eastern Daily Press, the coins were found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, where an ancient ruler was buried with his treasures. he was in a ship.
The first coin in the Norfolk Anglo-Saxon gold coin deposit was actually discovered in 1991, but it was only in 2014 that more coins were found, dating as early as 610 AD. original.
The BBC says some of these coins were minted by the Byzantine Empire, but most were produced by the Merovingian dynasty, roughly corresponding to modern-day France. At this period in history, Britain did not mint its own gold coins, so they must have come from somewhere on the European continent, as confirmed by numismatist Dr. Adrian Marsden, from Environmental Services Norfolk History.
In fact, many of the Norfolk coins were minted from the same molds in the same workshop as those found in the purse at Sutton Hoo, Dr Marsden added. He suggested that the treasure was probably owned by an Englishman who frequented the Merovingian kingdom.
Dr. Marsden also emphasized that these artifacts may have been part of a burial mound, which was then scattered due to plowing over the centuries (the artifacts found were discovered near a cemetery Anglo-Saxon ).
Ian Richardson, senior treasure registrar at the British Museum in London, suggested that this may have been a traveling merchant, as all the artifacts came from a single hoard, but no container was found. any.
Solidus Victory Coin issued by Merovingian King Clovis I between 491 and 507 AD. ( http://cgb.fr/ / CC BY-SA 3.0 )
The stored gold coins traveled across the continent
In addition to the Sutton Hoo mint, there are also coins from Frisia (modern-day northern Netherlands), Austrasia (parts of modern-day Germany and Austria), and the French regions of Aquitaine, Burgundy, and Provence.
Most of the Anglo-Saxon hoard of gold coins in Norfolk was Frankish. There are also nine gold coins, larger coins from the Byzantine Empire worth three coins. Tremissis or tremis means one-third of a unit. Tremisses were small gold coins minted in Late Antiquity. They were introduced into Roman currency by Emperor Theodosius I in the 380s and circulated for nearly five hundred years.
The hoard includes gold coins like these and a number of other gold items. (Norfolk Recording and Identification Service)
The Norfolk gold vault also contained four other gold objects, including a stamped or stamped gold pendant (worn as jewelry; produced in Northern Europe, during the German invasion), a bar small gold pieces and two other gold pieces made from gold. perhaps parts of larger pieces of jewelry.
These coins are not known to all experts and were previously identified only in a drawing in a book dating from 1666 AD, but were later lost.
The largest cache of Anglo-Saxon coins, before their discovery in Norfolk, was found in Hampshire in 1828 and included 101 coins.
Incidentally, while the first metal detectorist to find much of the hoard in Norfolk requested anonymity, the second discoverer was actually a serving police officer named David Cockle. He was caught trying to hide and profit from the find. He was arrested, suspended, and sentenced to 16 months in prison after pleading guilty in 2017.
