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Professur

Professur

Well-Known Member
Trinket found in English field could be missing part of ancient necklace

By MICHAEL MCDONOUGH





LONDON (AP) - An ornate trinket found in an English field by a metal detecting enthusiast is probably the missing part of an ancient gold necklace at the British Museum.

But the museum dismissed widespread speculation Wednesday that the ornament belonged to Boudica, a British warrior queen who led a failed rebellion against the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago.

The chunky five-centimetre-wide ring, decorated with a swirling motif, was discovered last week by Steve Hammond, 65, a retired chemist scanning a field in Sedgeford in the eastern county of Norfolk.

Hammond found the piece several centimetres beneath the ground's surface, said Chris Mackie of the Sedgeford Historical and Archeological Research Project, which oversaw Hammond's field walk.

Photos of the trinket appeared to show it is the missing end-ring - or terminal - of a gold torque found in Sedgeford 39 years ago that now belongs to the British Museum, museum spokeswoman Hannah Boulton said. A torque is a twisted metal collar or necklace that was worn by ancient Teutons, Gauls and Britons.

"Our curator hasn't had a close look at the terminal that's been found, but he's reasonably sure that it's the other end" of the torque, Boulton said. "Until it's brought to the museum and fully investigated, we won't know. We're just going on the photos for now."

Hammond, who could not be reached for comment Wednesday, told the Daily Mail newspaper that he mainly finds old buttons and shotgun-cartridge ends. "I have been metal detecting for 30 years and this is the most fantastic thing I have ever found," the paper quoted him as saying.

The British Museum has hundreds of torques similar to the broken one found in Sedgeford, which curators believe was buried around 75 BC. It is 18.4 centimetres long and "particularly ornate," Boulton said.

It is made from gold wire twisted several times over to form eight separate ropes. The ropes were in turn twisted together to form one thick chain, and hollow gold terminals cast in molds were added at either end.

Many of the British Museum's other torques were found near Sedgeford between 1948 and 1990, including the Great Torque from Snettisham, which the museum describes as the most famous object from Iron Age Britain.

British newspapers speculated Wednesday that the Sedgeford torque may have belonged to Boudica, queen of the Iceni people, an Iron Age tribe that lived in an area that today includes Norfolk.

Boudica led a revolt against the Roman rule of Britain in AD 60-61, about 17 years after the island's conquest. She defeated a Roman army and destroyed the eastern city of Colchester, then the capital of Roman Britain. Her armies then sacked London and Verulamium - now known as St. Albans - before being crushed by the Romans. Boudica is thought to have killed herself with poison.

Boulton dismissed the idea that the Sedgeford torque could have belonged to Boudica, as it was buried more than 100 years before she lived. But she said that it may have been somehow connected to the Iceni.

The newly discovered terminal will be sent to the British Museum for study. After it is evaluated, the museum may buy it.
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Source

British Museum

Sedgeford Historical and Archaeological Research Project
 
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Looks like no one replied, ever.
 
I saw a BBC documentary about her and her rebellion. It was mighty cool stuff. If I knew then what I knew now, I would have responded with inquisitiveness.

I wonder if there have been any updates on the story.
 
Professur said:
You kids need to pay more attention to your history. insert crochety old fart smilie here
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My history? Britty-land is a pretty fair distance from where I file my taxes.

I may or may not have learned about it in school... but I seriously doubt it. The world history I went through in high school was skeletal bordering on the scant. If my base knowledge was to be drawn from what I was taught... then little things would never exist... like Napoleon, WW2, India, subsaharan Africa...

God knows the extent of my Roman teaching was basically a 30 minute lecture going from : expansion, Julius C., Ides of March, Friends, Romans, Countrymen..., Cleopatra, aqueducts, Nero, corruption, Constantinople, barbarians, collapse.

The occupation of the southern UK, Hadrian, the Wall and whatnot were simply overlooked.
 
unclehobart said:
My history? Britty-land is a pretty fair distance from where I file my taxes.
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Yer all former Brits, y'know. 'Cept the Dutch

I may or may not have learned about it in school... but I seriously doubt it. The world history I went through in high school was skeletal bordering on the scant. If my base knowledge was to be drawn from what I was taught... then little things would never exist... like Napoleon, WW2, India, subsaharan Africa...
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Today nothing happened before Martin Luther King.

God knows the extent of my Roman teaching was basically a 30 minute lecture going from : expansion, Julius C., Ides of March, Friends, Romans, Countrymen..., Cleopatra, aqueducts, Nero, corruption, Constantinople, barbarians, collapse.
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fucking brilliant, doncha think, considering that their judicial and political systems were the basis for your own.

The occupation of the southern UK, Hadrian, the Wall and whatnot were simply overlooked.
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Until Braveheart.
 
Professur said:
Yer all former Brits, y'know. 'Cept the Dutch
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Only the true east-coasters. The area of Florida and parts far west were Spanish. Everything west of the Mississippi was a contingent of French settlements. I'm sure Gato would love to know what part of Britain his ancestors came from. He probably thinks theyre African or something equally silly. As for myself... my blood is primarily German.

Today nothing happened before Martin Luther King.
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Except the slavery and opression that he personaly slew with the jawbone of an ass.


fucking brilliant, doncha think, considering that their judicial and political systems were the basis for your own.
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Hindsight is 20/20... and still blind as a bat.


Until Braveheart.
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Nope... even then as well. Half the audience probably had no idea where England or Ireland was.
 
unclehobart said:
Only the true east-coasters. The area of Florida and parts far west were Spanish. Everything west of the Mississippi was a contingent of French settlements. I'm sure Gato would love to know what part of Britain his ancestors came from. He probably thinks their African or something equally silly. As for myself... my blood is primarily German.
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And if you really want to nitpick you're just all Africans :rolleyes:
 
AlphaTroll said:
And if you really want to nitpick you're just all Africans :rolleyes:
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...as told by the latest scanty clues of the last 50 years of anthropology. I still think there are many more puzzle pieces to fall into place before we can absolutely call all humanity a product of 10 million year old meerkat-protomonkey-man.
 
unclehobart said:
My history? Britty-land is a pretty fair distance from where I file my taxes.
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What about the indians that lived in your land?

It always surprises me that many seem to ignore them as roots. It would be like saying our history comes from Spain, when in fact, Spain is just a part of it.
 
unclehobart said:
Slaughtered, domesticated, scattered, smallpoxed into oblivion, own all the casinos... take your pick.
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I was thinking more of a How White man! Maize is corn, Happy Thanksgiving, Pocahontas, Custer, Trail of Tears, Firewater, Reservations, Casino kind of timeline.
 
unclehobart said:
Slaughtered, domesticated, scattered, smallpoxed into oblivion, own all the casinos... take your pick.
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I meant why ignoring them as part of your history and replace them entirely by the britons.
 
Luis G said:
I meant why ignoring them as part of your history and replace them entirely by the britons.
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I didn't do that. It was Prof that did it. I mentioned pretty much everyone but them. I did that because their effect upon current society is minimal. The languages, customs, dress... all a smoking trainwreck.
 
unclehobart said:
...as told by the latest scanty clues of the last 50 years of anthropology. I still think there are many more puzzle pieces to fall into place before we can absolutely call all humanity a product of 10 million year old meerkat-protomonkey-man.
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now there's one less.
A hominid skull discovered in Ethiopia could fill the gap in the search for the origins of the human race, a scientist said on Friday
The cranium, found near the city of Gawis, 500 km (300 miles) southeast of the capital Addis Ababa, is estimated to be 200,000 to 500,000 years old.

The skull appeared "to be intermediate between the earlier Homo erectus and the later Homo sapiens," Sileshi Semaw, an Ethiopian research scientist at the Stone Age Institute at Indiana University, told a news conference in Addis Ababa.

It was discovered two months ago in a small gully at the Gawis river drainage basin in Ethiopia's Afar region, southeast of the capital.

Sileshi said significant archaeological collections of stone tools and numerous fossil animals were also found at Gawis.

"(It) opens a window into an intriguing and important period in the development of modern humans," Sileshi said.
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that's kinda nifty.
 
Now see, that's why I want to go to England metal detecting. They find really cool old shit there. Damnit, now you've got me in the mood for some dirt fishing....but I gotta work tomorrow :crying4:
 
Speaking of old shit. I bought an old J. H. McBrayer whiskey bottle (early 1800's) on ebay not long ago. J. H. just happens to be a distant relative of mine (I know where I got my taste for whiskey). The seller told me the bottle was dug from a privy in Michigan. WTF is a privy?
 
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