It might just be rookie’s luck, but an amateur Norwegian metal detectorist is celebrating his good fortune after unearthing what could be the nation’s biggest ancient gold discovery in more than a century.
Last week, the Archaeological Museum at the University of Stavanger announced the discovery of a cache of nearly 100 grams of gold objects more than 1,500 years old, discovered on the island of Rennesøy in southwestern Norway.
“This is the gold find of the century in Norway. To find so much gold at the same time is extremely unusual,” said director Ole Madsen at the Archaeological Museum at the University of Stavanger, in the press release, which was translated from Norwegian.
The gold hoard was discovered by Erlend Bore from Sola. According to the museum, the 51-year-old bought his metal detector a year ago and he sees it mostly as a hobby to get out of the house.
Bore had spent much of the day scanning the beach on Rennesøy and said that he didn’t find much luck, so he moved to higher ground. He added that, at first, he didn’t know what he found.
“At first, I thought I had found chocolate money or Captain Sabertooth coins. It was completely unreal,” Bore said.
Although the gold disks looked like ancient coins, the museum said that they were, in fact, jewelry. The gold pendants are known as “bracteaters,” and the museum said that they were not used to buy or sell goods with, but were decorations.
Håkon Reiersen, associate professor at the museum, said that the jewelry dates back to around 500 AD. Round gold pearls were also discovered with the bracteaters.
“The nine bracteates and gold pearls have formed a very showy necklace. The jewelry was made by skilled jewelers and was worn by society’s most powerful. It is very rare to find so many bracteaters together. In Norway, no similar discovery has been made since the 19th century, and it is also a very unusual discovery in a Scandinavian context,” said Reiersen.
The museum said that the motif on the gold disks also makes this a unique discovery. The bracteaters feature designs of a horse.
The Museum explained that traditionally, the symbols on the pendants usually show the god Odin healing the sick horse of his son Balder. However, these gold disks only shows the design of the horse.
“None of the archaeologists in Rogaland County Municipality have experienced anything like this, and it is difficult to describe the excitement when we got to see these,” said Marianne Enoksen, section manager for cultural heritage in Rogaland County Municipality.
According to Norwegian law, all objects found dating back to 1537 and coins older than the year 1650 are considered state property and must be reported and handed to the authorities.
However, the Cultural Heritage Act says that finders of loose cultural heritage can receive a finder’s fee, which must be shared equally between the landowner and the finder. So far, the museum has not determined the value of the objects Bore found.
Source : Kitco
