LONDON An amateur treasure hunter prowling English farmland with a metal detector stumbled upon the largest Anglo-Saxon treasure ever found, a massive seventh-century hoard of gold and silver sworddecorations, crosses and other items, British archaeologists said Thursday.
One expert said the treasure found by 55-year-old Terry Herbert would revolutionize understanding of the Anglo-Saxons, a Germanic peoplewho ruled England from the fifth century until the Norman conquest in 1066. Another said the find would rank among Britain’s best-known historic treasures.
The hoard consists of at least 650 items of gold and 530 silver objects weighing more than 2.2 pounds (1 kilo), along with some copper alloy, garnets and glass.
A total of 1,345 items have been examined by experts and 56 lumps of earth were found to contain metal artifacts detected by an X-ray machine, meaning the total will likely rise to about 1,500.
Most of the objects are ornaments for weapons and other military artifacts, some inlaid with precious stones.
“I think wealth of this kind must have belonged to a king but we cannot say that for absolute certain,” Bland said.