Roman ring story found with Whites DFX

Story by: anon

A GOLD ring which was found in a field near Sandbach and dates back almost 2,000 years has been officially declared as treasure.

An inquest in Macclesfield declared the ring, which is made of solid gold with a blue nicolo glass setting, probably dates back to the Roman period between AD200 and AD400 and was therefore treasure.

The ring was found by a keen metal detectorist in early May 2013 when searching fields in the Sandbach area with the farmers permission.  After entering the field, he switched his detector on and almost immediately got a good clear signal.

The detectorist, who wishes to remain anonymous, said: “I dug down just a few inches and when I sifted the soil, a glint of gold was seen. In my palm was a beautiful gold ring with a blue stone. Through 20 years of metal detecting I knew it was of some antiquity , but wasnt sure exactly what period it was from”

  

“I immediately took it for the farmer to see, who was amazed such an artefact had been found on his land. I did check the area where I found the ring, but located nothing else.”

The ring was soon submitted to Manchester Museum, where it was recorded and submitted to the British Museum under the Treasure act 1996. An examination of the ring determined that the gem is of a blue glass, possibly nicolo glass, with chamfered sides and a flat, light-blue upper surface. The gem is plain and not engraved. The gold band of the ring is wide but thin at the shoulders, and thickens and narrows at the back of the hoop. The shoulders are decorated with two engraved swirls on either side.

This was not the first item of gold treasure the finder had found. He said:" In the late 1990’s I found a gold posy ring circa AD1600 in Cheshire and was blown away by its beauty. I feel incredibly lucky to find yet another item of treasure. Its made even better when, according to the Portable Antiquities database, its only the third such gold Roman ring found in Cheshire. That makes me very proud to have made such a contribution to Cheshire's history. This is not the first time I have found gold treasure and I am very impressed with my Whites DFX metal detector which continues to locate great finds and wouldnt change it for the world”

http://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/561272

Latest Finds With The V3i

Here are a few items found by STe Shorters using his Spectra V3i

Trebonianus Gallus

Story By:- justinian

The weather was fantastic on Sunday, so drove out to my usual hunting ground and pulled this beauty out of the dirt. It was lying at the farthest point in my swing, and I just caught a bit of it - with a short broken bleep. A repeat swing over the target area revealed a soliud signal, VDI of 72 and heavy on the 2.5 Khz frequency. The coin was minted in Rome in 251 A.D. by emperor Trebonianus Gallus. The reverse shows the Roman goddess Libertas, the same goddess whom the American Statue of Liberty was modeled after.

Trebonianus Gallus AR (silver) Antoninianus. Rome mint: 251 AD.
Obverse: IMP CAE C VIB TREB GALLVS AVG, radiate draped bust right.
Reverse: LIBERTAS AVGG, Libertas standing left holding Pileus & Vindicta.

Libertas is seen here holding a PILEUS. The pileus was a brimless, felt cap worn in Ancient Greece and later also introduced in Ancient Rome. It was associated with the manumission of slaves who wore it upon their liberation, and became emblematic of liberty and freedom from bondage in classical antiquity. In Ancient Rome, a slave was freed in a ceremony in which a praetor touched the slave with a rod called a vindicta and pronounced him to be free. The slave's head was shaved and a pileus was placed upon it. Both the vindicta and the cap were considered symbols of Libertas, the goddess representing liberty.

IMP CAE C VIB TREB GALLVS AVG translates to “Imperatator Caesar Consul Trebonianus Gallus Augustus”.
LIBERTAS AVGG translates to “Liberty of the Emperors” - (Plural, for him and his co-emperor Hostilian.

Trebonianus Gallus

Gallus was born in Italy, in a family with respected ancestry of Etruscan senatorial background. He had two children Gaius Vibius Volusianus, later Emperor, and a daughter, Vibia Galla. While Governor of Moesia (the south bank of the Danube, from Serbia to Macedonia), Gallus was a key figure in repelling the frequent invasion attacks by the Gothic tribes of the Danube and became popular with the army, bolstered by his official image: military haircut, gladiatorial physique, intimidating stance. In June 251, the current emperor Decius died in the Battle of Abrittus at the hands of the Goths they were supposed to punish for raids into the empire. When the army heard the news, the soldiers proclaimed Gallus emperor, despite Hostilian, Decius' surviving son, ascending the imperial throne in Rome. Gallus did not back down from his intention to become emperor, but accepted Hostilian as co-emperor, perhaps to avoid the damage of another civil war. Gallus proclaimed his son Volusianus as Caesar, and he was appointed as such by the Senate.

Anxious to secure his position at Rome and stabilize the situation on the Danube frontier, Gallus made peace with the Goths. Peace terms allowed the Goths to leave the Roman territory while keeping their captives and plunder. In addition, it was agreed that they would be paid an annual subsidy. On June 24, 251, Decius was deified, but by July 15 Hostilian disappears from history—he may have died in an outbreak of plague. Eager to show himself competent and gain popularity with the citizens, Gallus swiftly dealt with the epidemic, providing burial for the victims.

253 was not a good year for Gallus. Persians pushed their way across Syria, Armenia, and Turkey and burned the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus. The Celts north of Danube rose back up, and the Scythian tribes crossed the river and were once again on the loose behind the Roman border.

The Governor Aemillianus took initiative and defeated the invaders, much to the linking of the Legions. Since the army was no longer pleased with the Emperor, the soldiers proclaimed Aemilianus emperor. With a usurper, supported by Pauloctus, threatening the throne, Gallus prepared for a fight. He recalled several legions and ordered reinforcements to return to Rome from Gaul under the command of the future emperor Publius Licini Valerianus. Despite these dispositions, Aemilianus marched onto Italy ready to fight for his claim and caught Gallus at Terni before the arrival of Gallus’s son Valerianus and his reinforcements. What exactly happened there is not clear. Later sources claim that after an initial defeat, Gallus and Volusianus were murdered by their own troops, or Gallus did not have the chance to face Aemilianus at all because his army went over to the usurper. In any case, both Gallus and Volusianus were killed in August 253.

Early Bronze Age Axe Head and Sword

Finds by: Eric Soane

Pictures of the finds I brought into the office on Tuesday morning.  1and 2 are views of a piece of late Bronze Age sword about 5 inches long and 2 inches wide, dating to around 1000 BC.

1. Fragments of Late Bronze Age Sword

2. Fragements of Late Bronze Age Sword

3 is an Early Bronze Age axe head.  This is actually pre bronze being composed of pure copper and dates to 2500 BC to 2200 BC, around 4500 years old.

3. Bronze Age Axe Head 

Wedding Ring lost in remote Highlands

A Story by:- Dan Young

I lost my wedding ring in a remote region of the Scottish highlands during a survival course. Everyone said “don’t bother trying to find it – it’s gone”.

Here is the area:

I couldn't shake the feeling that I could find it. On my return to London I stared researching the best metal detectors available. After a lot of research and some pointers from detectors societies, I called Angela at Whites in Inverness. It was perfect because Inverness was where my sleeper train arrives into, and where I was hiring a 4x4 to go look for my ring.

After reading about the products at White’s I wanted the M6.

This is the ground conditions in the general area I was searching:

I spent a lot of time before I started searching trying to think where it would have come off, and felt the most like was either in the cold river crossing exercises or when we were building our shelter (as I was taking my gloves on and off repeatedly). I felt the latter was most likely as my ring has a good snug fit. And besides if was in the river I was toast anyway.

After getting permission from the landowner I was all set. The big day started badly due with delays to some curious directions from Google and some road closures, I arrived at the search site 2 hours late with limited time to complete my search. The midges were out in force. This time I had 2 x head nets (yes – one fine mesh and one super fine. I needed both on)

After ground balancing I got a couple of pings and dug up some foil in an old fire. (it was nice to know the machine was working!)

After 24 minutes I got a clear ping and switched to pinpoint. With my hearth thumping I started to feel around in the boggy long grass. I couldn’t see anything so had to go by feel. After 30 seconds or so I felt something brush my right hand and fumbled around and found it! Was the best feeling!

Ring went straight onto my hand and hasn’t left it.

Thank you to Angela, James and the team at White’s Electronics in Inverness. Amazing service! The M6 is incredible.

The Glory of the Army

Story by: justinian

I went out Saturday on a short trip about an hour from my house to a hay field that had been recently harvested. The field wasn't plowed, so the going was not so great. But then the farmer showed up and told me that he was about to plow the field and said I could search behind him!

I was using the White's V3i, and the standard 10" DD coil.  I hunt in relic mode, in stereo mixed mode.  I tuned the machine to this specific area, using 3-frequencies, 7.5 Hz band-pass ground filter, RX gain of 8, Disc 82, and a recovery of 56.  The tractor was quite loud so I had my V3i wireless headphones on which did a great job of blocking the noise.

Since the farmer didn't plow very deep, I was not expecting much, but I still managed to find an encrusted ancient coin.  It took me almost three hours to carefully pick away the century's old dirt with a stereo microscope, but my patience paid off when I uncovered a perfectly preserved Roman bronze coin from the mid 4th century with it's lovely green patina fully intact (chemicals or brushing would have stripped the delicate patina and ruined the coin).

Obverse: CONSTANTIVS P F AVG with a diademed bust of Constantius II.
Reverse: GLORIA EXERCITVS with two soldiers, each holding a spear and shield, and one standard between them. The Christogram (ChiRho) appears at the top of the standard.

The coin is was minted in Siscia (Croatia) between 337 - 341 AD.

Constantius II (Latin: Flavius Julius Constantius Augustus was born in Sirmium (Serbia) on 7 August 317 and died 3 November 361. He was Roman Emperor from 337 to 361 AD. The second son of Constantine I and Fausta, he ascended to the throne along with his two brothers Constantine II and Constans upon their father's death.  In 355, Constantius promoted his last surviving cousin, Julian, to the rank of Caesar. However, Julian claimed the rank of Augustus (Supreme Emperor) in 360, leading to war between the Julian and Constantius. Ultimately, no battle was fought as Constantius became feverish, and died late in 361, though not before naming Julian as his successor.

Gloria Exercitus translates to (The) Glory of the Army.

The back of the coin is interesting.  It shows two soldiers, spears and shields in their hands, and a Roman military standard between them.  On top of the standard is the Chi Rho symbol, one of the earliest forms of christogram, and is still used by some Christians. It is formed by superimposing the first two (capital) letters chi and rho (ΧΡ) of the Greek word "ΧΡΙΣΤΟΣ" (Christ) in such a way as to produce the monogram. Although not technically a Christian cross, the Chi-Rho invokes the crucifixion of Jesus, as well as symbolizing his status as the Christ.

After Constantine, the Chi-Rho became part of the official imperial insignia. Archaeologists have uncovered evidence demonstrating that the Chi-Rho was emblazoned on the helmets of some Late Roman soldiers. Other coins and medallions minted during Emperor Constantine's reign also bore the Chi-Rho. By the year 350, the Chi-Rho began to be used on Christian sarcophagi and frescoes. The Chi-Rho symbol was also used by pagan Greek scribes to mark, in the margin, a particularly valuable or relevant passage; the combined letters Chi and Rho standing for chrēston, meaning "good."

The labarum was a military standard that displayed the "Chi-Rho" symbol. It was first used by the Roman emperor Constantine I. Since the labarum consisted of a flag suspended from the crossbar of a cross, it was ideally suited to symbolize crucifixion.

Constantius II died in the town of Mopsuestia, an ancient city on the Ceyhan River in modern-day Turkey. The ancient city is now a small village located approximately 10 mi east of Incirlik U.S. Air Force base near Adana, Turkey.  I was stationed at that base in the mid 1980's and never would have dreamed that someday, while stationed at another post in Europe, that I would find a coin that connected these two distant assignments!

M6 Nails 400 Year Old 8 Reale - Shared From WhitesElectronics.com

I live on Florida's Treasure Coast and strictly hunt the beach. I do dry and wet sand, but can not detect in the water due to admiralty leases. A few weeks ago we had a few days of large waves and I figured that I would venture out and see if the ocean had left me (or possibly uncovered) some goodies. I was working the previous high tide line which was pretty dry by now. 

8 Reale

My M6 was in the beach mode with no discrimination and the sensitivity at 3 O'Clock. I also had the pinpoint toggle forward for multiple tones. After an hour of the usual beach stuff like bottle caps, pull tabs, clad, lead sinkers etc, I got a high pitched tone that bounced around the low 90's on my VDI and read as "$1". I pi pointed the tar get and saw it was 7" down. Two scoops later and I had an encrusted piece of silver in my hand that weighed 26.7 grams. After a night of electrolysis as well as a good cleaning with a toothbrush and Colgate (great for silver), I had a beautiful 8 Reale that has been identified as being from the 1618 Cabin Wreck! Thanks for making awesome machines right here in the USA !!!

M6 In Action

Find From Guido Ooms from the Netherlands

French Army Button - 1790

Stirrup Mount - 900 - 1200 AD

Thimble - 1325 - 1500

Finally a little something for me (my wife really) Shared From Whites Electronics.com

This past Sunday my detecting partners and I were out detecting a local park my V3i was picking through the maze of targets pulling out all the solid signals as I was getting coins, pull tabs, foil and pieces of shredded aluminum can.

Out in the middle of an open space in the middle of the park I received a hit of 17 with big solid bars on the screen of my machine. I went to pinpoint mode and viewed another good target signal on the polar plot. When I probed the ground I was having a hard time finding the target so I pulled out my electronic pinpointer and discovered the target was near the surface.

I made a small incision in the turf, pulled the grass pack a couple of inches and there was a nice looking ring in the root system of the grass. I have been having a bit of a dry spell on making any good finds so I assumed it was just costume jewelry and placed in my pouch and walked towards my hunting partners. Part way to them I had to stop and look at the ring, it felt heavy when I pulled it out of my pouch.

Upon looking at the ring with my loop I could see 14 kt stamped into the band. My partners and I have a deal that whoever makes the best find of the day has to buy ice cream for the group, they were happy for my recovery and I now owe them ice cream.

Diamond Ring

When I got home I cleaned the ring a bit and showed it to my wife, she looked at it, smiled and tried it on. It fit her. I have been asked to search for many lost pieces of jewellery over the last few years and all that I have found have been returned. This find is one that I just happened upon and it is nice to finally take one for for me, well my wife really.

V3i is still doing what it was bought for, Shared from Whites Electronics.com

I went back to a house site that I found four silver coins my first time out with my V3i. Because so many said I should do so and slow down when I swing. I did just that and found this 10k mans ring with a ruby in it.

Ruby Ring

I also found a 1918 walking liberty half. I love the V3i's digital interface, it is like having a high end computer for a detector. I am betting if I go back to other places where I didn't find any thing, I will now, with my V3i.

1918 Liberty Half

Roman & Robert Part 5 by Eric Soane, Inverness

Roman & Robert Part 5

The next day, goody goody only slight rain, but the ground was a quagmire and needing a change of operating technique.  This time to avoid moving the JCB too much we would work on a small area of the extension and work down to the base layer then move on to the next section.  The decision to extend provided the right one as nine more Denarii were found, fortunately none near the end of the trench so it was deemed the end of the scatter.

When the base of the main trench was cleaned up there was no evidence of why the hoards had been buried on this particular spot, but the plotted finds spots did reveal from the concentrations that the two hoards were probably placed about ten metres apart.  There was evidence of a possible field drain from the 19th century cutting right through the hoard area which might have disturbed both hoards and later identified as a the base of an enclosure wall.

Four more trenches were opened on slightly higher ground adjacent to the main focus of the dig, looking for some evidence of habitation to try and give a reason for the coins being buried in that location.  Three of the trenches were formed into an H shape and it was at the junction of two of these that a cobbled surface turned up, albeit very damaged.

H shaped trenches

This area gave up a number of pieces of Iron Age pottery and piece of iron slag giving evidence of  metal work

Insert Pic 13 Insert Pic 14

Iron Slag

Iron Age Pottery

The presence of this settlement gives weight to the theory that the Romans gave to local chieftains as a bribe to help prevent many of the tribes uniting  against them.

This brought the overall totals to 32 Denarii and 18 Medieval coins.  The last three days of the week long dig were mainly about archaeological work in the trenches and as I was only need to check trenches when they were left I busied myself detecting on an adjacent field where the grass was shorter apart from patches which were too long and lush to allow any sort of swing.l  Among the usual modern items associated with the festival I found a few Georgian items and then on the last day I had a signal which showed as six inches in depth and the numbers indicated that it was copper alloy.  Pinpointing was exact and I soon had the item in my hand and realised that it considerable age.  It was about an inch long and a quick brush showed that part of it was enamelled, given the location I immediately thought Roman so after taking a GPS reading I decided on a cup of coffee and presented the item to Fraser hoping he would confirm its Roman origins, but no, even better he said early medieval and when pressed on the "early" he said 8th or 9th century and Pictish.  Pictish items are even rarer than Roman coins in the area and it raised so much interest that passed through the Treasure Trove assessment.

Pictish Find
The geometric pattern shows yellow enamel in the outer parts and red in the centre.
Its use is unknown at present but may have some sacred use.

It would be easy to imagine that this brings the saga of the hoards to a close but I had plans up my sleeve.  The trenches were to be filled in by a contractor working on the estate and I managed to meet up with him and explain that it was myself that had found the original coins which had precipitated the dig and that I had a feeling that there might be more coins outside the main trench and that as time had run out on the dig there had been no more time to extend the trench further.  The work being done was very complicated and he was unable to give me a time or day when the trenches would be filled but he was interested and offered to help.  Unfortunately on the day the work was done I was out early and did get the message he left on my phone.  I went to the estate at about 3pm to see him and try to find when the work would be done only to find him almost finished.  He still helped though by extending the trench about two metres lowering the level down by another 6 inches.  I stepped into the trench and immediately found a Denarius and soon after another two.  It is a pity that I could not be there all day as there could still be more to come but soil has to be removed as they are too deep for the detector.

3 Denarius

Is this the end of the saga now?  Who knows?  I will check the area again in case any coins have somehow got into the spoil heap and been re-deposited in a position where the detector can find them.  This is unlikely but the possibility is there.  Whatever the final outcome the three years spent working on  the site have been a great experience and the results have been beyond all expectations for a site in the north of Scotland.  In view of the Pictish find mentioned earlier there could still be more interesting finds to come, I still have some unexplored areas on the estate.

My work on the site has also put me in contact with other farms in the area which I look forward to trying.

Some of the coins from the dig before cleaning
still showing soil in the indentations.
The Roman coins are largely unidentified at present

All accounts and information correct as of November 2012, (c) Eric Soane 2014

Roman & Robert Part 4 by Eric Soane, Inverness

Roman & Robert Part 4

By the time they arrived rain was in the air, although only light at this stage, a decision was made on the size and the position of the trench based on the flags I had placed earlier and the JCB set about taking off the top few inches ready for me to get in with my detector.  After about an hour detecting behind the JCB all I had to show was a collection of nineteen rusty tent pegs and a couple of bottle tops.  The rain was getting heavier by this time and I decided on a cup of coffee and a change to a more waterproof jacket.  Shortly after restarting a strange signal with varying numbers came up on the display and as it showed over six inches deep I thought it prudent to dig it.  The result was a broken Robert II penny from about six inches and was probably too deep for the machine while the top level of grass was intact.  This aroused a good bit of interest and made the rain seem less, I set to work again and immediately got a sort of double signal within a metre of the first find, again showing six to seven inches depth, this turned out to be a Robert II Groat.  I now had an audience as I dug the other part of the double signal, this only showed itself detecting from one direction, and this turned out to be a half groat again from about six inches.  There was nothing further on this first day and as the weather and light had deteriorated it was decided to end the day with me just going over the last area that the JCB had cleared.  This was when the rain started and continued all night.

There was a late start on the second day, no one was keen to get going as it was so wet.  The trench was half full with water and I suggested that the JCB could dig a channel from the lowest corner to let the water drain away, this worked but just resulted in a stream running through all day but at least it was under control.

The plan was made for the level to be lowered about three or four inches at a time and for me to detect over each level.  I actually got going somewhere around 11am and shortly unearthed a broken Robert II penny, this aroused some interest meaning a lull in the detecting, the restart produced a Robert II Groat which was quickly followed by two more.  With this Collection of Seven medieval coins it was beginning to look as if there were no Roman coins left to find, but the detecting gods were just teasing.  It was now nearing lunch time and I had progressed to the end of the cleared area when I found a Denarius, Archaeologist happy!! and off to lunch for a change of clothes as I was completely soaked, but so what when you are finding the goodies.

After lunch dry and refreshed and relatively warm I faced the rain again.  The field was in large puddles by this time and was draining through the trench, exiting through the gully the JCB had made.  The whole trench was a sea of mud and it was difficult keeping balance in it.

I almost immediately found another Denarius, quite near the previous one, and the technique to dig these was to build a small dam and the uphill side of the signal and scrape a channel for the diverted water to run away leaving the hole relatively clear of water, unfortunately there was no way of stopping the rain falling into the hole.  This Denarius was followed by six more and within a small area.  The next signal was different and turned out to be another Robert II Groat and about three feet away yet another, this was turning into a fantastic day -- What rain??  And who would care with these finds.  A quick stop for coffee and another change of clothing, it was a good job I always have two sets of spare clothing in my van, and back to work.

This next period delivered four more Denarii and the time approaching 6pm and down to the base level it was decided that I should just over the area again in case anything had been missed.  This produced an anomoly, a Groat down about five inches into the sub soil, was this the actual base level or not?  However a dig showed evidence of a tunnel made by a mole or another animal and obviously the coin had been carried down into it.  I put in a suggestion that the trench be extended on the third day as two of the Denarii had been found right at the base of the end of the trench.  I was lucky on the way home as I passed through quite a deep flood with the Fire Brigade in attendance, shortly after the road was closed and someone else from the dig was sent on a lengthy detour.

Work in the excavation on the third day

Area where most of the Denarii were found

Roman & Robert Part 3 by Eric Soane, Inverness

Roman & Robert Part 3

In view of this latest find I was naturally very keen to get into a really detailed search of the main area again as I reasoned that the other half of the groat was still there in the ground and possibly other.  The stumbling block was the length of the grass so I came up with the idea of approaching the owner and requesting to mow an area which encompass the circle of the groat hoard and the main body of the Roman hoard (six coins), this area would only be about twenty metres square which would make virtually no impact on any crop being taken off and as the site was not visible from the nearby road and was at the opposite end of the field to any estate track the secrecy of the site would be ensured.  The agreed and I arranged to cut the grass on a Friday afternoon ready to spend a whole day on this small area on the Saturday.  Despite covering the whole area carefully in one direction, and again at right angles, nothing else was found.  I tried again at a later date using my spare machine, but again nothing.  Late on in the day the owner came to me in the field to see if anything had been found and suggested I might try extending the mow area and I said I would try when the grass was dry as it had been really difficult mowing when it was wet.  At this stage he was also toying with the idea of ploughing the small area of the field but he decided against it in the end.  I had also pointed out to him that the best day of finds came after the field had been rolled and he says this may be possible buy I suppose it will be after the corn crops are in.  After several days of dry weather I returned to the site and using GPS I put in a flag where each coin had been found and extended the mown area to cover all of the finds then set about detecting, but again no more of the hoard coins were found.

At the end of November I had been to a late evening meeting and consequently did not check my emails for that day and was out early the next morning.  On checking my emails in the evening I found that the previous day I had been informed that the geophysical survey of the site had been done that day and I had missed it.  When I received the readout I realised that only about half of the area had been covered and there was little to make on it because of all the rubbish still in the ground related to the camp site.  The decision was taken to not do a further survey as the results were too inconclusive but it was hoped to do an excavation in the late spring.

Over the holiday period and into the new year, dodging the snow and frozen ground I managed to do a bit more detecting on the field and worked in a random pattern and came up with the remains of another Denarius, badly damaged and with the legend completely missing, over 100 metres away from the hoard site.

Denarius Remains

When I found this it appeared to be just a piece of rubbish and if it had been found anywhere else would probably been consigned to the rubbish box, I only scrutinised it further because it was on the hoard field and at about the same depth as the earlier finds.

This find prompted another systematic sweep of the field using my row of poles to guide me, no more Roman coins but I did come up with a half ring brooch

Half Ring Brooch

During further visits I found little but modern objects mostly associated with the festival until July when the grass had been cut ready for the next festival and during one day I found two Edward I pennies and a complete ring brooch all away from the hoard site.

Edward I Pennies

Completer Ring Brooch

At last after several false starts I heard that funding had been obtained to do a dig on the site to undertaken by Dr Fraser Hunter, Principal Curator Iron Age and Roman at the Nation Museum of Scotland on a date in October 2012.  As the time approached I checked that it was still on schedule and offered to got out before the event and flag the positions of the coin finds using GPS.  I further contacted the farmer and arranged for him to cut the grass in the area which I marked out because by this time of the year the grass and clover had grown to a height which made detecting impossible and would certainly  make spade work really difficult.

I was out early on the day of the start of the dig to rake off the cut grass, this was hard work and took about two and half hours.  I had time to give the area a quick once over with the detector but only found two twenty pence pieces and a five pence plus several ring pulls and some rusty tent pegs.  I then put in flags in the positions of the Roman coins (white) and the Robert coins (red) and had my lunch while I waited for the Archaeologists from Edinburgh.

Roman & Robert Part 2 by Eric Soane, Inverness

Roman & Robert Part 2

I attended a weekend conference which consisted of a number of talks on the Roman, Bronze Age and Iron Age finds in the Elgin area.  This gave me the opportunity to contact Dr Fraser Hunter, Principal Curator, Iron Age and Roman at the National Museum of Scotland who had led the dig which had unearthed the two hoards of Roman coins there.  During the following week he visited my site with me and was of the opinion that it could follow the normal Roman practise of being on a site of previous Bronze and Iron age occupation and he hoped to arrange a geophysical survey of the area to see if it could produce ecidence of the occupation, in the meantime I was to carry on with my search, although the grass was making good growth and it would not be long before detecting became impossilbe.

I approached White's Electronics to see if it would be possible to get the use of a Hoard Hunter to try to find the source of the Roman coins.  The fact that the coins were scattered in a line in the direction of the last plughing and were mainly better condition on one face led me to believe that they might have been sitting in a pot and only in contact with the soil on one side.  I explained the position and the possibilities of further finds and was given the use of a machine over the weekend.  The first day on site I covered the area thoroughly in one direction and there were very few positive signals which all turned out to be rubbish, I returned to my XLT and finished up the day with a random search of the area with no result.  The second day I covered the area at the right angels to the previous attemt with the same result, just rubbish.  I again went back to the XLT and set to with the garden line working very slowly, this produced another Robert II Groat in quite a fair condition and yet another Denarius which was the worst condition example to date but still with some detail .

After the weekend I returned the hoard hunter to White's and had a word with Hames about getting the absolute depth from my machine, he suggested some possibilities of balancing some of the settings and I was very keen to get back to the site to try them out as I felt that I hdad a better chance of finding the source of the Roman coins with the XLT than I had with the hoard hunter which is really set up to find large objects.  The pots holding the hoards at Birnie were relatively small but would present a large target for the XLT and I assumed that any pot on the site which had been hit by the plough would probably be sitting no more than 12 inches down.

The next visit to the site I set the detector to the new settings and spend the first two hours digging up very small pieced of sliver paper and pieces of coke then a very faint signal almost like iron but with high numbers which when pin pointed showed as eight inches in depth.  I was working with a trwel and dug down using my probe to locate the object which turned out to be year another Robert II Groat.  I measured the hole using the probe which gave a depth of exactly eight inches, things were looking good for finding any pot which may be there.  Shortly after, only about seven feet away another Denarius gave itself up, this one only about three inches down.  This brought the total to

10 Denarii
5 Robert II Groats
2 Robert II Pennies

The site now become unworkable due to the length of the grass and further detecting would have to wait until after the next festival at the beginning of August.  When the festival finished the whole site was covered in rubbish and a professional company was brought in to clear it up, they did a good job and the site was left visibly clear but the small items hidden in the greass were missed these included the bane of detectorists, thousands of ring pulls.

My first task was to work the general area of the hoards to remove as much as possible of the new deposits, this yielded a few articles of cheap jewellery and an amount of spendable cash along with a huge quantity of tent pegs, ring pulls, and silver paper and other rubbish much of it non metal, eyes only find.  At this stage I was thinking that there would be no more Robert II or Roman coins to be found  because of the thorough way I had covered the site earlier in the year and there had been several months and heavy rains to give coins the opportunity to move in the ground and nothing deep had shown up.

I reluctantly abandoned the area and moved on to the rest of the field, removing tent pegs, ring pulls, cash and sundry items.  This year there did not seem to be any reasonable jewellery just cheap costume items, designed to look good from a distance.  During this time the had begun to grow at a rate and in some of the areas shaded from the sun began to get too long for detecting, it was fortunate that most of the items I was recovering were on the surface so loss of depth was not a problem.

I decide that I would have one last look at the hoard site before the length of the grass made it impossible.  I used my GPS to locate the position of a coin which was recovered from the centre of the scatter area and marked it with a flag.  Working out from this point moving as slowly as I could and pushing the detector down through the grass, hard work this, I located a twenty pence piece and a penny and then I got a very poor signal which I would normally have rejected as a small piece of silver paper but the machine registered erratic numbers and was showing a depth of three inches and as it was the hoard site I decided to dig it.  At four inches there was sign so out with the probe which located something at about three inches but off to one side.  Careful excavation of the side of the hole produced half of a Robert II Groat of the Edinburgh mint

Half Robert II Groat

Roman & Robert Part 1 by Eric Soane, Inverness

Introduction

This is an account of metal detecting on Belladrum estate, it details some of the best finds and in particular the finding of two important coin hoard find.  That these two hoards were found in the same small area and intermingled makes the discovery unique and being separated by some twelve hundred years. makes for interesting debate. You will see that archaeologists are involved in trying to make sense of the site and at the time of writing there is evidence to explain the Roman hoard but not the Medieval one.

Roman and Robert

Starting in January 2009 I began working a music festival site to remove tent pegs for the owner which were liable to cause injury to the farm animals using the area between festivals.  The site was full of coins and jewellery, in fact there was hardly a visit went by without at least one piece of jewellery being found.  There were over thirty rings along with bracelets, pendants, and chains.  This was a very labour intensive operation, taking something like 200 hours.  Early on in the exercise I expectantly dug up a Roman Denarius.

Roman Denarius

One of my first actions was to check with the National Museum of Scotland that it was a genuine coin and with confirmation of this it was submitted to the Treasure Trove Unit.  At this time no great sigificance was placed on this find, the general feeling seemed to be that it could have been dropped there at any time, even in recent yearts, and as there was no evidence of any Roman activity in the area I was prepared to go along with this theory. although at the back of my mind I half felt that given recent finds of Roman artifacts and coins about forty miles away this could turn out to be a genuine Roman loss.

I found a good way to fully cover the field at this point, there were four white plastic poles in the field which farmers use to string out electric fences and I placed these in a row across the field.  As I passed each one I moved it across the width of my swing then came back on th opposite side of them.  I thought this would ensure that I fully covered the area and nothing would be left behind.  I certainly deluded myself with this assumption as you will see later.

After a number of visits the area was covered and a good collection of spendable cash and jewellery had been collected I thought that I must have missed some items so I returned and set about a bit of random searching which continued to throw up more jewellery and coins and eventually I decided that the best course of action would be to use the poles again and cover the field at right angles to the first search.  Many more coins and jewellery turned up which showed that no matter how carefully you work you will never get every item in the ground.  One day when I returned, the field had been rolled and as I was detecting near the area where I had found the Denarius I dug up what at first thought to be a grotty button, however after giving it a rub I saw detail on it and realised that it was another Roman coin, I marked the spot and carried on till lunch time, about half an hour later, when I able to collect my GPS unit form the car to take a reading of the find spot.  I carried on and about ten minutes later I unearthed another and a short time later yet another

Denarius

Remember this is in an area where there was supposed to be no Roman activity.  My first action at this point was to contact the Treasure Trove Unit in Edinburgh to inform them of the mini hoard, then I plotted the finds on graph paper using my GPS readings, this clearly showed that the finds were more or less in a line which coincided with the plough marks still slightly visible from the last ploughing several years earlier.  I contacted the owener and arrtanged to him to explain what I had found and discuss the implications with him.  He was delighted to hear of the finds and urged me to carry on and see the exercise through.  I also arranged with hime he would a feature on the Festival website of the jewellery found, which included several wedding rings and attempt to return them to their owners.  I explained to him that I had found a considerable sum of money which more than covered my expenses and I offered to replace several recently planted trees in fenced areas which had dies and he was pleased with the arrangement and said he could let me know the type of tree that had been planted in each box.

At this point I decided to review my methods of detecting in the area of the hoard.  Using my GPS I marked the find spots and set out a rectangle 100m by 50m with the findspots running down the centre and worked it again using a garden line as I decided that the poles were not accurate enough, they were useful however to mark the corners of the rectangle.  I crossed the area tin the shortest direction, going up one side of the line and back down the other then moving it over and repeating until the area had been covered. This produced one more coin which again was on th alignment of the previous finds.  The plots on the graph showed four coins in quite a small area and one about 30m away.  Within the area of the four close together finds there was another unusual find for the district, a Robert II Groat in excellent condition which dated to about 1380

Robert II Groat

To make sure that I had made a good job of clearing the area I decided to work again at right angles to my earlier effort.  This produced the greatest surprise of the the whole exercise, the first half hour saw another Roman coin in the bag, this was followed by a quiet spell of about an hour than a small coin turned up in a hole and I immediately thought it was another Roman, but no, inspection revealed a Robert penny of the same issue as the groat previously found.  The next find was a complete locking buckle, this was followed shortly after by a broken ring brooch with a lovely green patina.

Locking Buckle

Broken Ring Brooch

Then another Denarius followed and after a quick break for lunch back to detecting and almost immediately a deep signal produced another Robert II Groat in really beautiful condition from about eight or nine inches down, this was quickly followed by another in good condition although not as good as the previous one.  At this point the stock man arrived to warn that he had just put a cow into the field to join the others already there.  The cows had not been any bother up to this point but apparently the addition had a vicious streak and had attacked him and his assistant.  It was obviously time to pack up but as the herd was way over the far side of the field I decided to just finish off the row I was working on, this was the finish of the area I marked out and in fact was covering about three feet outside the area.  About halfway up the row I found a damaged Robert II penny and shortly after another Denarius.  This brought the haul for the day to three Roman, four Robert II coins, a spur buckle, and a part ring brooch, astonishing for the North of Scotland.  The most amazing thing is to find to hoards, separated by about eleven hundred years, in the same spot.  At this point there were eight Roman coins, including the first find which was sent the Treasure Trove Unit earlier, and five Robert II coins from the two hoards.

Eight Roman and 5 Robert II coins