by A hoard of around 1,000 copper coins was found by a metal detectorist looking for discarded tractor parts on a farm in Poland. The accidental find was announced on March 2 on the Facebook page of the Lublin monument preservation service.
The remains found underground on the property in late February near the small village of Zaniówka date back to the 17th century.Metal detectorist Michał Łotys was using his new equipment to look for parts that would be useful for her tractor his sister.
To Łotys’ surprise, the instrument began to ring due to coins. He scraped off a layer of topsoil and found the objects inside a broken local-style earthenware pot with a narrow neck.
According to the Facebook post, the entire hoard weighs about 3 kilograms and contains coins of varying degrees of preservation. Oxidation after around 400 years in the ground means that all the copper objects are now green in colour, with many corroded together in layers. But about 115 of the coins are loose.
Pole discovers hidden treasure of hundreds of 17th century coins
Pole discovers hidden treasure of hundreds of 17th century coins
According to the website living science, Using a metal detector to search for buried remains without a permit is illegal in Poland, so Łotys contacted archaeologists in the nearby city of Lublin, about 150 kilometers southeast of Warsaw, who visited the farm the day after the find.
The discovery site revealed that the treasure was placed deliberately because of a clear mark on the ground, according to the Polish news agency. First news.
Most of the coins were struck between 1663 and 1666 at mints in Warsaw. Vilnius in Lithuania? and Brest, which is now part of Belarus, but at the time was part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth
The coins are known as “boratynki” in honor of the Italian Tito Livio Burattini, who was the director of the Krakow Mint at the time, as detailed on the Polish Metal Detector website. Zwiadowca Historii.
Burattini introduced copper coins into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth because they were much cheaper to manufacture than the existing silver coins in the kingdom. and because his treasury was destroyed after years of war with Sweden, Russia, and the Cossacks.
Although the Italian was later accused of degrading the metal of the objects and made huge profits, the coins were quite popular, even if not very valuable. A thousand of them only bought “about two pairs of shoes” at the time.
Exactly why these coins were buried in today’s farm is unclear. It is possible that the owner wanted to hide them from enemy forces, but was later killed or moved away and did not return for the treasure.
The artefacts will now be taken to experts at a museum in the nearby town of Biała Podlaska for further research. Fragments of a broken clay jug and various pieces of cloth from the period were also found at the site.
