(I hope this is not a repost) There was an interesting late Roman coin hoard found in Switzerland. Although not a spectacular find, it was interesting that imaging with a CT scan was used to more closely assess the hoard. (Translations are from Google Translate and I’m not certain of their accuracy): “JACKPOT – A POT FULL OF LATE ROMAN COINS AT BUBENDORF In September 2021, volunteer Daniel Lüdin found a pot with 1,290 coins from the 4th century AD near Bubendorf Portions [of coins in the pot] were divided [by a piece of leather]. The timing of the concealment is unusual because the coin hoard was placed around 332-335 AD, which is hardly known.” Although the link is in German, the photos are very nice. Be sure to look closely at the embedded 3D image in the link below. The computed tomography clearly showed that the coins were placed in the pot in two portions. The thick black line between them turned out to be a piece of leather when exposed. Archeology Baselland https://www.archaeologie.bl.ch/entdecken/fundstelle/155/jackpot/
I've been playing with the 3D model on the linked page, and now I'm a little seasick. If you zoom into the surface of the model, it turns inside out. VERY cool link, thanks! Wonder if I can find more details on what equipment they used to do the CT? Edit: looks like they sent it to EMPA, which has several machines that would be up to the task (PDF link).
..."Although not a spectacular find..." I'm sorry, but how is discovering a piece of history that was buried for ages not a spectacular find?
Not really. You see, an archeologist doesn't care so much about the gold and/or silver. A true archeologist cares about the history of the find, more than anything else. At least that's my take on archeology. You seem perfect for the task.
It's amazingly hard work. When I was in Uni, they had a summer archeology dig with a UK University and they were willing to take an engineer to make up the numbers. I had a blast, but they quickly found my level of skill and I spent most of the 3 weeks carrying buckets of recovered tile up to the wash station (we found the spoil pile from the monastery's industrial site that summer). Those buckets were HEAVY. Although the best was when we were digging in the graveyard. The monks had very little use for the mortal remains (the souls were already taken care of) and so they buried them without headstones or really much care. We (and by we I mean the people who knew what they were doing - my role consisted of carrying buckets of dirt to the screens) had removed two bodies leaving a small area between them, oh, about 9" wide. The deputy head of the dig said "Oh, there's nothing in there, I'll take it out with a pickaxe". Three swipes and CRUNCH. Which now triggers the reversion to archeology. Gently removing dirt with small tools, revealing an unexpected set of remains. UNFORTUNATELY, the next day was the open house for the town folk. All morning people would file past the graveyard and see the damaged skull in full glory. Sixty times that morning you heard "Look there Harry, that bloke's been pickaxed". By 9:30 am the deputy head of the dig had taken to her caravan for a lie-down. The rest of us made it to 11 when we headed down the road for a well deserved pint (or 3).
@furryfrog02 it most surely was. We had a local helper, who led us to the good bar and the good chippy in town. Not out of the goodness of his heart, nor for the pitiful allowance they paid. Nope. As we learned legging it away from the local cop on the 2nd weekend (because we weren't supposed to use the alley as a public necessary) - he was helping us as his community service. But we also learned other important life lessons. The Lady's bar cost 50p more per pint but had softer chairs and a public necessary. Not worth it for young men. Nobody alive could eat BOTH 2 pieces of fish AND the 50p portion of chips. Those were meant to feed the entire family. Sheep are stupid - they didn't think it was any different to chew on the tent rope or grass. It did make a difference to the tent occupants. Sheep can clear a 4' fence from a standing start if sufficiently motivated. Sneaking up behind them and screaming at the top of your lungs provides sufficient motivation. It's important to have at least one person who has done cooking for groups at a dig. Our catering staff were the wives of several of the junior professors and lecturers (a different time). Very nice people, but they didn't quite understand the difference between TEASPOONS and TABLESPOONS when it came to black pepper in the Chili. Even the camp dog required the chili to be cut with its weight of pasta before eating it. And while volume 1 of the British Army Field manual has all the recipes you need, volume 2 has the information to set up meal plans.
