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From billion dollar finds to gems from ancient times, we count down the Top 10 Biggest Hidden
Treasure Stashes Ever Found.
#10: Ringlemere Gold Cup Perhaps the only cup to rival the NHL Stanley
Cup, the Ringlemere Gold Cup was discovered by an amateur archaeologist with a metal detector.
While searching Anglo-Saxon remains for a period of months, he found many small trinkets
and items with a modicum of worth. It wasn’t until he found a small cup that had been crushed
by a plough. Not knowing he had happened onto the Ringlemere Gold Cup that had rested mere
inches underground, the British Museum snatched the piece up for over half a million dollars.
#9: Loose Change In 2010, another metal detector wielder was
searching Somerset, England, when he discovered a two foot tall pot buried beneath the ground.
Lo and behold, once unearthed, the pot contained 52,503 silver and bronze coins—all dating
back to the third and fourth century, and equaling about half a million dollars. Here’s
the twist: the coins were likely buried to encourage Roman Gods to bless the lands with
a fair harvest. While some may find that foolish, it still tops much of our current global warming
efforts to date.
#8: An Ancient Medallion As if etched in the pages of an epic action-adventure
film—in 2013, a small medallion engraved with a ram’s horn and Torah was found fifty
meters outside of Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Dating back to 614 CE, the medallion existed
during the Persian conquest of Jerusalem. While the medallion did not contain the spirit
of any deities of transcendental heroes, it was a very, very rare and valuable item from
the Byzantine period, and has earned its moniker as the Ophel Treasure.
#7: My Life For The Hoard In 2007, a man and his son discovered a large
stash of treasure near the town of Harrogate, England. The treasure dated back to the Viking
era, and consisted of 617 silver coins, and almost 70 other ornaments, metals and ingots—all
contained in a silver and gold French vessel from about 900 AD. The coins showed Islamic,
Norse and Christian symbols, while the jewelry belonged to a high-ranking Viking. The total
amount of treasure, known as a hoard, which was found to have belonged to a Viking leader,
was valued at over 2.1 million dollars. Again, this treasure was buried at some point, likely
due to the level of conflict that plagued the Viking lands near the end of the first
millennia.
#6: My Life For The Hoard Part II In 2009, the largest find of gold and silver
at the time happened in Staffordshire, England. Consisting of over 1,500 pieces of sword pommel
caps and hilt plates socketed with precious stones, this hoard’s find was simply the
result of one man asking his farmer friend if he could search around his land with a
metal detector. The man who found the treasure claims that some higher power had led him
to the treasure. That’s 6.5 million dollars worth of divine intervention, in case you
were wondering.
#5: 3,000 Years Young After the Six Day War, a family bought a house
in the Jewish Quarter of Israel. Akin to previous entry about faith and determination, the family
was sure that their house was built on the kind of ancient treasure that was helping
so many other homeowners land major headlines. Well, after 18 years of excavation beneath
their basement, the family has found ancient rooms cut from rock, ritual baths, cisterns,
burial vaults from King Solomon’s reign over 3,000 years ago, as well as pottery,
coins, weapons and mosaics. Let’s just say, regardless of the housing market, this property’s
value certainly went up.
#4: Can’t Keep Away From The Hoard Hoxne, England is the third UK spot on our
list to crop up with a huge hoard find. A farmer lost his hammer in a field, and asked
his friend if he could use his metal detector to find it. When he returned to the spot,
he found much, much more than his hammer—including silver spoons, gold jewelry, and many coins.
When professional Archaeologists arrived on the site, they went ape and ordered an immediate
emergency excavation. Dating back to the fourth and fifth centuries, the finds were valued
at about 6 million dollars. If there wasn’t a ‘lucky hammer’ phrase then, there is
now.
#3: Under The Sea What would a lost and found treasure list
be without a seminal sunken treasure chest? In 2015, scuba divers were swimming along
the harbor of Caesarea National Park in Israel when they found a single gold coin. What could
have been a huge letdown, as they first mistook the coin for a child’s toy—turned into
infamy when they noticed the markings on the coin. The Israel Antiquities Authority leapt
onto the scene, and nearly 2,000 coins were discovered—and labeled priceless.
#2: King Prithvi Narayan Shah’s Secret Stash This one plays out like a true adventure film.
We have all the standard elements—unassuming workers accidentally discovering something
amazing, a centuries old structure in Nepal, and a group of several hundred year old leaders
known as the Malla Kings. The treasures were found in a storage room of the Hanumandhoka
Palace. The find resulted in over 3 kg of gold and 80 kg of silver—which, funnily
enough, had been simply locked in a room…for several hundred years.
#1: The Mega-Billion Dollar Moment We’ll cut right to the chase: on a single
day in 2011, 500 billion worth of rupees was found in six underground chambers of the Sree
Padmanabhaswamy Temple in Southern India. While you picture that famous scene from Aladdin,
we’re just going to start listing off some of the ridiculous items that were found: a
gold necklace weighing 5.5 pounds, a golden bow, a golden rope, one ton of gold, sacks
of diamonds, 37 pounds of gold coins, precious stones in silk, sovereigns from the 1700’s,
and thousands of pieces of jewelry. While the chambers were built as a chapel for religious
rulers, supreme court members had fire services immediately open the secret chambers. The
value landed somewhere between 10 and 14 billion dollars.
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Stashes Ever Found .. If you have your own top 10 idea, leave it in the comment section
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