Around 800 years ago, a traveler buried gold jewelery and around 30 silver coins near the old Viking settlement of Haithabu – but never got them out again. Only now has the medieval hoard been rediscovered. Among the finds are two intricately designed earrings set with precious stones and a gold-plated brooch with a clasp imitating an Islamic coin. This provides exciting insights into the time after the end of the Viking era.
The Viking settlement of Haithabu and the Danewerk border wall in Schleswig-Holstein are among the outstanding testimonies of the Viking Age around a thousand years ago. At that time, Haithabu, on the Schlei, was an important trading center for long-distance Viking trade and one of the southernmost outposts of the Viking Empire. At that time, the ramparts of the Danewerk, which were in the immediate vicinity, secured the borderland between Scandinavia and mainland Europe at the narrowest point between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea. Today, the Haithabu-Danewerk Archaeological Border Complex is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Accidental discovery during a probe exercise
A metal detectorist has now made a special discovery near Haithabu. Nicki Andreas Steinmann was just about to complete his training as a detectorist. Because in Schleswig-Holstein, permission to search with the metal detector is only granted after training and passing an examination from the Archaeological State Office. As part of the practical exercises, Steinmann was assigned an area on a practice area near Haithabu. When he was there under the supervision of mentors with his metal detector, it struck several times. When digging in the ground, the researchers came across several coins and two gold objects.
The probers then immediately informed the responsible excavation technician of the Archaeological State Office. He immediately took over the finds and organized a controlled excavation in this area, in which the group also participated. The aim of such investigations is to salvage the remaining finds and to document the circumstances of the find. These can provide information about the circumstances of the deposition and are the basis for later research. In fact, the excavation unearthed additional silver and gold-plated finds. Part of it formed a hoard, others were subsequently easily relocated by plowing and other agricultural activities
Gold jewelry from the Mediterranean
Overall, the hoard includes two gold earrings, a gold-plated coin fibula and several gold-plated rings, a small formerly gold-plated perforated disc and around 30 silver coins, some of which are heavily fragmented. Textile remains have been preserved on several of these coins. They suggest that jewelry and coins were originally in and buried in a cloth pouch. The archaeologists were able to use the coins to date the hoard find more precisely. They date from the reign of the Danish king Valdemar II, who reigned from 1202 to 1241. According to the state archaeological office, this indicates that the hoard was deposited in the first half of the 13th century.
Thus, these valuable objects were only hidden in the ground after the end of the Viking Age and the destruction of Haithabu in 1066. The design of the pieces of jewelery also speaks for this. The two golden ear pendants date from around and after 1100 and are in the tradition of Byzantine goldsmith work. Another special find is the gold-plated pseudo-coin fibula – a coin fashioned into a robe clasp in the Scandinavian tradition. The current find is an imitation of an Islamic coin, an Almohad gold dinar. The Almohads were a Muslim dynasty that ruled over much of the Maghreb and southern Spain between 1147 and 1269. The find of these jewels from the south illustrates the far-reaching connections in this region even after the end of Haithabu.
Source: Archaeological State Office Schleswig-Holstein (ALSH)