Viking Treasure!

During the Viking expansion (AD 800-1150), people stockpiled silver coins and objects in iron boxes and bowls and holes in the ground, all over Scandinavia and northern Europe and, for one reason and another, never retrieved them. These long lost treasures have been found by farmers of the region over the last few centuries, and are still found by people today---the Harrogate hoard was discovered in Yorkshire just this past summer. Over the holidays, I read several articles on Viking hoards collected in a book called Silver Economy in the Viking Age, and edited by scholars James Graham-Campbell and Gareth Williams.

The book includes a dozen articles on different aspects of Viking hoards, and I recommend it for the general public with a couple of caveats. The typeface is simply too small for visually challenged folk like me (I think it must be 8 point) and there are numerous undefined words that us typical non-specialists aren't likely to know. But, after all, what's a dictionary for?

At any rate, I learned a lot (always a good reason to use the word 'Treasure' in a blog title), and have been able to put together an article on Viking hoards and one on the Cuerdale Hoard for your edification. If these tweak your curiosity, be sure to take a look at Silver Economy in the Viking Age.

• Viking Hoards
• Cuerdale Hoard
• Silver Economy in the Viking Age 2007. Edited by James Graham-Campbell and Gareth Williams, published by Left Coast Press
• Viking Age Archaeology

The Harrogate Hoard was donated to the Portable Antiquities Scheme at the British Museum, and a whole bunch of photographs of the hoard are on their Flickr site.

• Viking Treasure Hoard Uncovered In North Yorkshire, blog from Anthropology.net on the Harrogate Hoard discovery
• Photos of the Harrogate Hoard, from the PAS Flickr site
• Portable Antiquities Scheme, the British Museum
• The Harrogate Hoard, report in Current Archaeology