A homeowner in Denmark has unearthed the largest hoard of Viking-era silver in the country's history while digging in his garden to install a new outdoor patio.
The owner, from the Riebeld area in northern Denmark, initially thought he had found an old piece of iron or fence wire while weeding, but soon discovered jewelry, coins and silver ingots buried in the ground.
The extraordinary hoard weighs 18.5 kilograms and contains approximately 700 pieces and fragments dating back to the 10th century AD, nearly three times the weight of the previous largest silver hoard found in Denmark (6.5 kg). The homeowner said that after half an hour of digging, his garden pitchfork struck something that made a strange noise. When he began digging with his hands, he managed to pull out piece by piece of metal from the ground, discovering that it consisted of jewelry, coins, and silver ingots.
The treasure was buried in a clay pot during the 10th century AD. Around 320 items, weighing 6.4 kg, remained inside the pot, while the rest were scattered in the surrounding soil. The hoard includes silver ingots, bracelets, whole and fragmentary coins, pieces of cut silver, and even a small hammer belonging to Thor (the Viking god of thunder). One of the silver ingots bears an enigmatic runic inscription that may mean "hutu," but experts are uncertain of its meaning, suggesting it could be a personal name or a royal mark.
Archaeologist Torben Sarau described the discovery as being like finding a "treasury" from the Viking Age, stressing that it is important for understanding the Viking Age in Denmark, because it shows how silver served as a means of wealth and payment in that era, as the Vikings used silver by weight, cutting or melting it as needed for commercial transactions.
Interestingly, the researchers found that many of the pieces were concentrated in specific weight groups, suggesting that they were deliberately organized as a store of wealth.
Some of the coins reveal the extent of Viking trade networks, as the hoard contains both Arab and Anglo-Saxon coins, indicating links stretching from England in the west to the Islamic world in the east. Among them are two silver coins from the reign of King Edward the Great, who ruled between 899 and 924 AD, providing important evidence of the hoard's age.
This discovery follows a series of remarkable finds in the region. The discoveries confirm North Jutland's links to a vast Viking-era trade network, but it remains a mystery why someone buried 18.5 kg of precious silver more than 1,000 years ago and never returned to retrieve it.
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