> He had reported his find to the intermunicipal organization Archeology West Friesland, where he also works. The pieces were then taken to the National Museum of Antiquities, where they were cleaned, preserved and examined.

I thought it was just a hobbyist at first. In most countries, are you allowed to keep or sell rare artifacts you find? Or do they just automatically belong to the state or something?

Interesting! If I'm reading the maps correctly that area experienced some massive foods in the 12th and 13th centuries. Maybe the treasure was deposited by one of them?

Depends on the country, for example, it is illegal to metal detect in Hungary without an affiliation and permission from a county museum.

Anything found becomes property of the state, and is placed in the custody of the museum.

I guess only if you make the find public.

I've actually always wondered how hard it is to find a "fence" to sell treasure that was supposed to be relinquished to a museum.

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In most countries anything culturally significant or historic or valuable past a certain amount, goes to the government. Sometimes there is a reward that the museums or gov will give to the person who found it but it's rare that if you found a treasure it's yours, and rare to get a large cut. In many countries you have to report any finds within a certain amount of time.

On private land sometimes it's a deal you make with the landowner before you have permission to scout the land.

A lot of people just don't report their finds and sell them through a black market, or just keep them as souvenirs and don't sell them or notify anyone.

Probably shouldn't have tried to take it through the airport then.

Finders keepers in the US, but we don’t have stuff like this.

Will you search the loamy earth for me?

Wasn't there a Holy Roman Emperor who died in Hoogwoud too?

Nope that was Willem II of Holland, the father of Floris V. He was killed in 1256 indeed in Hoogwoud while fighting against the West-Frisians. I believe his horse collapsed and he was mangled by the locals who first had no idea who he was. After they found out the buried his body beneath a fireplace in one of the farmhouses.

His son Floris V revenged the dead of his father later in his life and killed a lot of West-Frisians, and been at war with them for a long time. Also builded a lot of castles surrounding the area from where he could easily attack them. O and he did recovered the remains of his father at some time in history .

Willem II was holy roman emperor wasn't he? Or at least anti-emperor

He was crowned by the pope and reigned the Holy roman-German reich between 1248 and 1256. Next to his countmanship of Holland and Zeeland 1234 - 1256.

In the Netherlands, any treasure like this has to be split 50/50 with the owner of the property on which the find was made; they must also provide archeologists the opportunity to study the find in detail for at least six months; after which the owners are free to do with it as they please.

I heard an interview with the historian who found these artefacts yesterday. Apparently there was a lot of quarrel that Friesland had with the state government down in Holland which resulted in many small scale battles and fights over the years. Since there weren’t banks at the time people that wanted to secure their stuff from being raided would bury it.

Rest of Europe should look at the Danish system. We have a ton of people going around detecting in their free time and then turn their finds in.

He was crowned as King of the Germans, and the Pope explicitly supported his election. But he was killed before he made the trip to Rome for the actual coronation as emperor (which would have been a massive military operation through enemy territory he had not been capable of before being killed).

👏Came here looking for a reference

Any system that doesn’t reward people fairly for their find is a system that encourages black market sales.

When you say the owners can do with it as they please, do you mean the owners of the land the item was found on or the person who the item?

The problem with that system, is there are without a doubt a bunch of dishonest detectorists who probably keep, and or sell their finds.

Even with regulations in Hungary, it's still a problemm

This is a horrible system. Plucking metal objects out of their context results in lots of archaeological knowledge lost - we'll never know the age and context of those finds!

The medieval treasure was taken to the National Museum of Antiques where it was cleaned and investigated. The treasure was dated back to around 1250, which made them assume the treasure was buried then.

Doesn't seem so in Denmark. Maybe people are just more honest (statistics imply this).

Look up how it works before bashing it ;)

In my country you are only allowed to keep things made after 1537. Anything before that belongs to the state.

Both are owners. They can do with it as they please.

as i said, the find is split 50/50 between them. So it depends on whether its something that can be split easily (like a bunch of coins) or if its like a single item that is co-owned.

Oh, I DO know how it works!

Look at the Dutch auction website Catawiki. They regularly have auctions of ancient artefacts that appear to me to be from outside the normal channels.

To my understanding people find something and then they contact the professionals. Can you add something to that?

>Anything found becomes property of the state, and is placed in the custody of the museum.

And this often leads to the exact opposite of what the museum wants: The people will then either keep it or they will sell it on the black market, when they know, that maybe there's some kind of problems and punishments by the law.

I think, the state and museum should pay the guy that finds something and turns it in, rather than punish him. We are talking about very rare historical artifacts sometimes, some collectors are paying a lot for certain things.

Like in my country, a guy found an original dagger from the Roman Empire, dated around 15 BC. I'd like to have such a dagger in my collection and i'd pay a lot for it.

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