Viking find at Ardnamurchan

[Kyle MacLea]

Pretty interesting find! Lots of great pictures....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... l?ITO=1490

Kyle=

[Canadian Livingstone]

Hi Kyle,
Very interesting find.
One can only wonder what archaelogical treasures and viking plunder lie buried and undiscovered in Western Argyllshire.

regards,

Donald

[Jill Richmond]

Probably quite a lot, Donald. Thank you for posting the Daily Mail article about the Viking boat burial, Kyle. I only found out about it when I watched the Scottish news yesterday evening, but the BBC said nothing about it being a boat burial. For interest's sake, there was a splendid boat burial discovered in 1939 at Sutton Hoo in East Anglia, thought to be that of an Anglo Saxon king, and dating from the 7th century. If you wish to look at this go to:

http://www.archaeology.co.uk/the-timeli ... on-hoo.htm

The artefacts recovered from the site are now in the British Museum.

Jill

[Canadian Livingstone]

Hi Jill,

I imagine theres lots of buried treasure throughout the British Isles. Some of it was viking plunder, but also wealth land owners and clerics buried valuables to protect them from the viking raids and maybe never came back for them. Centuries later some farmer ploughing his field might come across a substantial find. Metal detectors these day are relatively inexpensive, but there are of course various restrictions in many Countries in terms of ownership of archaelogical finds and treasure located and discourage treasure hunters. Some places are even clamping down on fossil hunting and discouraging that popular hobby.

regards,

Donald

[Jill Richmond]

Too right, Donald!

Jill

[Canadian Livingstone]

Hi Jill and Kyle,

Speaking of treasure hunting there was a big news item in 2009 featured in the Guardian and on BBC News when a man on a disability pension equipped with a metal detector found the largest Anglo Saxon gold hoard in history buried in a farmers field in Staffordshire, England. The find ended up being worth millions. It consisted of decorative gold pieces broken up from a variety of saxon military related objects mostly ,for example a ornate battle helmet and some ornate sword handles. It is of course anyones guess who buried it and when. No doubt historians will ponder that question for sometime to come.

One thought is that they broke up some of the artifacts to facilitate transportation or to make it easier to hide. Saxons liked to bury some of valued property of a deceased great warrior so maybe this collection was part of some important Saxon warrior's grave that had centuries ago been looted and then buried and the thief never came back for it. Or it was simply taken as spoils of war from the home of some Saxon, perhaps some barbarian's hastily gathered loot or trophies from some battle won.The fact that it was broken into pieces of artifacts suggests to me it was somebodies loot rather than a prominent Saxon family smashing up their valued gold family hierlooms and burying them in such a way to prevent them falling into hands of raiders. There is some info online from the Guardian and BBC from 2009 and there is a feature article in the current November issue of the American magazine, National Geographic with photos and all.

regards,

Donald

[Kyle MacLea]

Ooh, sounds like a good issue of National Geographic to pick up, Donald! I have been very interested in this story as well.

Kyle=