Saturday, July 31, 2010

8/1 Report - Inscriptions on 1715 Fleet Gold Rings



1715 Fleet Gold Coin Found by Crew of Gold Hound in June of 2010.

The photo is from a June 19, 2010 TCPalm article found on the following web site.

http://www.tcoasttalk.com/2010/06/29/treasure-from-1715-fleet-found-new-stakeholder-hopes-to-bring-up-more/

Here is a web site by an archaeologist discussing the history of the 1715 Fleet and a few items found. Most interesting is the discussion of two rings and a bracelet that all bear the same inscription.

Here are the inscriptions.

1989 gold ring: Z+DIA+BIZ+S+ZB+Z+HGA+BFS++
1996 gold ring: Z+DIA+BIZ+SAB+Z+HG+F+BF
Bracelet - beach find: Z DIA BIZ SAB ZHG BFRS

I don't have any idea at this point, but it would be a good project if you want to do the research and decode it.

Here is the link to the article. Unfortunately it seems the illustrations are no longer attached.

http://www.tuspain.com/heritage/gold.htm

Information and time are two of your most valuable and probably most under-appreciated assets.

Information is worth what you make of it and is something that keeps on giving.

Your time, like it or not, is finite on this earth. What you you do with it determines its value. Every moment is either used well or wasted. You never have a second chance to use the same moment again.

Many years ago after having visited the Treasure Coast a few times without finding any treasure coins, I saw an ad in a treasure magazine for a map of the 1715 Fleet treasure beaches. Since I didn't find any treasure coins on my first trips to the Treasure Coast, I wondered if I was really on the right beaches.

I sent my money for the map and read it carefully when I received it. The map consisted of two photocopied pages and pointed out five of the "best" treasure beach sites.

There wasn't a great amount of new information for me on the map, but it was still just what I needed. Someone who had been successful and knew what he was talking about (Roy Volker), said these were good sites. Now I knew I wasn't way off when I made a trip to detect those places.

I had accumulated a large amount of information from a variety of books and sources on my own, by I preferred having the map. It gave the important information in a concise easy to carry form, and I didn't have to page through books filled with useless information to find the locations that I wanted.

Was the information on the map information that I couldn't have found for myself if I had done a bunch of research? No, of course not. But it saved me a bunch of time and quickly gave me confidence when I visited those beaches.

I don't remember how many trips it took before I actually found my first cob, but I know I made several trips before finally finding my first. And the funny thing is, when I found it, I wasn't sure what it was until I got it home and carefully examined it. In fact, my wife was ready to throw away that worn thin black disc before I told her to keep it. I remember the exact spot and how it happened still today.

But one point that I want to emphasize is the value of information. I paid something for that information and it was valuable even though there wasn't a lot of it and even though I might have been able to go to the library to research it by myself. I saved hours and hours of time and got confidence that I probably would not have achieved on my own. And that information was cheap - certainly not enough to compensate the originator for his time and experience.

I could have easily spent tons of hours on research without the same results. You might say that library information is free, but the hours I would have spent would have been a much greater cost than than what I paid for the map. And who knows how the chain of events leading up to today might have changed.

All of the information you get from this blog is free. And the time I spend on it is very valuable - if only to me.

In my opinion, every mature adult should figure what an hour of their time is worth to them and what they would sell it for.

Time is precious, and good information in the right format can help you make the most of your time.

I still appreciate that little map produced by Roy Volker in 1984. I'm sure he didn't make a fortune from it. He chose to share the inestimable value of his experience with others. I appreciate the value of that.

Forecast and Conditions. The wind is from the west and and the seas are calm and will remain calm through the coming week. Low tide is around 6:30.

There are two tropical disturbances. One to the south southeast will probably not develop, and if it does, will probably not affect us.

The other is in the middle of the Atlantic and has a 40% chance of developing.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

7/31 Report - Nails as Clues & 18th Century Brigantine



Photo of Square Nails Recently Found on Treasure Coast Beach by Ian A.

The ship discovered at the World Trade Center site appears to be a two-masted Brigantine from the 18th Century that as used as land fill. Nonetheless it seems the ship has added some information since more iron nails were found on it than expected.

Here is the link.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/29/a-brigantine-beneath-washington-street/?partner=rss&emc=rss

As you might suspect it is difficult enough to identify dug items but even more so from photographs. You lose a lot of information in a photo. You don't get a 3-D view, and don't get the sense of density, texture, etc. You also don't know much about the context, which often provides a variety of useful clues.

If you drop a dime on a ceramic tile, you can tell the difference between a silver dime and a clad dime by sound. The silver dime has more of a tinkling sound.

Try it out and see if you can tell the difference.

Some readers think that yesterday's mystery item is a piece of rebar. That could be. There are a number of spots along the Treasure Coast where WWII structures stood along the beach and some are now very close to the water line.

In my 4/22 post, I posted an illustration showing different types of nails that were used over that last few centuries. Today I have more good web sites that show how to evaluate the age of nails and therefore also the items they were used on. The links were provided by Ian A. as was the photo above of the recently dug nails that came from Treasure Coast beaches.

Here are three web sites that will help you learn to identify the different ages of different types of nails. All three webs sites provide some nice illustrations such as the one to the right which came from the University of Vermont site (third link).

http://www.harpgallery.com/library/nails.htm
http://www.worthpoint.com/blog-entry/tale-nails
http://www.uvm.edu/~histpres/203/nails.html

If you read through all three of these web sites I think you'll learn how to use any nails you find to evaluate a detecting site.

Whenever you find an older object on a beach, even if it is only a nail, you should check that area very thoroughly for any additional items. When an older item is found, that is a good sign that beach conditions at that spot are good, and the chances are good that other things might be accumulating there.

Forecast and Conditions. The seas are very calm this weekend with a low tide around six. No change in Treasure Coast beach conditions. There are a few low-tide areas that are still producing coins.

The tropical wave down by Puerto Rico still has only a 10% chance of becoming a cyclone. It seems to be heading west, into the Mexico or the Gulf.

The wave over by Africa is still too far away to predict much.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net