1st October 2010, 09:07 PM
Madweasels Wrote:Mike T.! So, from what I understand, and please correct me if I am wrong (I am sure you will - facts are difficult to come by in this case), a detectorist had been working the fields where the helmet was found for seven years and never found anything (no PAS finds, anyway) and then the helmet turns up. Seven years, found nothing and then finds the helmet. Hmmmm...that is one incredible 'chance discovery'. Oh, and I gather that the detectorist would have had to travel a considerable distance (50+ mile) to the fields to find nothing for seven years and then find this incredible 'chance discovery'. Hmmmm
I don't know what else he was finding. Obviously he must have been finding something to draw him back to the area. 50 miles isn't a great distance to travel to a productive site and it's surprisingly easy to miss an object as big as a Roman helmet in a field. The Staffordshire hoard was found in a field that had previously been searched by 8 other metal detector users. So 8 metal detector users managed to miss finding a hoard of 1,500 objects.
Maybe the finder of the helmet did find it somewhere else . I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt, but the authorities who know a lot more about the story behind it than myself, seem satisfied with his explanation of it's discovery.