PREVIEW: ANCIENT BRITISH HOARDS: 18 SEPTEMBER

Barely had the metal detecting rally begun on 26 August 2022, than detectorist Tony Asquith made his best ever discovery: a hoard of 35 Iron Age gold Gallo-Belgic staters on the surface of a field.

What has since been named as the Lenham Stater Hoard came to light at Lenham, South East of Maidstone, in Kent, just off the M20 a few miles beyond Leeds Castle, and as Noonans’ Coins and Artefact specialist, Nigel Mills noted, “only 35 miles away from Pegwell Bay near Ramsgate where Julius Caesar initially landed”.

Tony, who has been detecting for over 45 years, recalls that “on the Friday morning, the opening day of the Rally, my first find was just a short piece of string with some wire at each end; the second was a shotgun percussion cap; and the third was a bit of ‘can slaw’. Finally, something of interest came up: an odd brown disk. As I looked at this thing I noticed down on the ground close by what looked like chocolate buttons, all laid together. This seemed very odd, so I put on my glasses and looked again. I was looking at a pile of dirty, brownish, Celtic staters! It was bloody amazing!”

The coins lay on the surface in a neat little parcel, looking to the world as if they had just been
dropped onto the field. Interspersed amongst the Celtic horses were fragments of flint and, as the finder carefully looked through the pile, a coin was found to be embedded onto the inside of a fragment of freshly broken flint nodule.

As the attending archaeologist reports, “Careful searching and recovery of the rest of the fragments allowed the flint to be pieced back together and revealed the coins to have been deliberately stashed into a hollow spherical flint with a natural opening in one side.”

We might imagine that the coins presented here sat undisturbed in their flint nodule for over two millennia; recent agricultural activity pulled the flint sphere up to the surface, it cracked, and the contents spilled out. It is a happy coincidence that the hoard was found when it was before it could be disturbed and dispersed by further agricultural work.

Nigel Mills said: “In his volume Coins Hoards in Iron Age Britain, Philip de Jersey notes ten hoards which were contained in such flint nodules; the phenomenon, then, is unusual but not rare. The distribution of these hoards is informed by ‘underlying geography’ and in this sense the Lenham Hoard follows the same pattern.”

All but one of these other flint nodule hoards have been acquired (at least in large part) by museums. The exception to this rule, the Chute III Hoard (PdJ 277.3), was dispersed through various different venues, while the accompanying flint nodule was acquired by Devizes Museum.

“The staters date to around 55BC after Julius Caesar had conquered Gaul and attempted to invade Britain,” said Nigel Mills. “They all have a shallow domed obverse with a dished reverse that displays an abstract or devolved horse galloping to the right with a charioteer’s arm above. The coins were concealed within the flint nodule which was formed 90-70 million years ago. The hollow interior would originally have contained mud and the decayed remains of marine animals.”

Presented in 36 lots, including the flint nodule, the Staters are of the series E [Ambiani], Gallic War uniface type. The highlight depicts a stylised horse standing right, with charioteer’s arm above, and ‘coffee bean’ with curve of pellets before the horse’s face. The complex exergue comprises a corded line over a row of linked annulets, and the coin weighs 5.95g. Well centred, and better than very fine, it is estimated at £600-800.

The hollowed flint nodule container, found in-situ with several coins imbedded inside, measures around 67 x 70 x 60mm. Broken into eight large pieces and professionally reconstructed, it is very rare and interesting and is estimated at £80-100.
“We are delighted to be able to offer the Lenham Hoard in its entirety, including the flint nodule, in a single session; in doing so we present a unique opportunity for collectors to acquire items of considerable numismatic and archaeological interest,” said Nigel Mills.