Amateur Archaeologist With a Metal Detector Finds 934 Roman Silver Coins in a Field in Western Germany

A trove of 934 Roman silver denarii was discovered by an amateur archaeologist with a metal detector in a field in Wesseling, Germany. The coins date to the time of the Roman emperor Hadrian.

When his metal detector wouldn’t stop beeping last year, Oliver Riedl called authorities and a group of experts began digging immediately to discover the biggest collection of coins from this time period in the country, per the local archaeology office.

The 6.8 pounds of silver was likely buried deliberately in the second half of the second century CE, according to the LVR Office for the Preservation of Archaeological Monuments in the Rhineland.

“Of course, we can only speculate about the motives, but it’s very likely that someone wanted to keep this money safe. After all, banks didn’t exist back then,” Erich Classen, a state archaeologist and the director of the office, told ABC News. Though it’s still unclear why the treasure had never been recovered, Classen added, “perhaps the owner died before that could happen, without being able to pass on the knowledge about the coins.”

It is also unclear who buried the treasure. “At that time, an ordinary soldier in the legion earned 300 denarii a year,” Rahel Otte, a research associate at the archaeological office, explained. “However, about half of that was withheld for food and equipment. A legionary would therefore have had to save all of his disposable income for about six years to amass the Wesseling hoard.”

Between 39 BCE and 459 CE, under General Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa, the Romans had expanded the empire’s border along the Rhine River, where they established a military outpost that later became Colonia Agrippina or present-day Cologne.

The treasure is now on public display at the nearby LVR-LandesMuseum Bonn.