Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.
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| Texas Might Get Hurricane Harvey Source: nhc.noaa.gov |
Looks like Harvey became a hurricane and will hit Texas. As you can see from the map, there is another area off the West Coast of Florida to watch, but it will probably not become a cyclone anytime soon, but it might bring us some more rain. It probably won't do much more than that.
We still have some good tides along the Treasure Coast, but the surf won't be much for at least a couple of days.
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| Intertwined Silver Knots Submitted by Al C.
Al C. sent the above photo of a ring he found along with the following eamil message.
A while back you talked about silver rings not being found on the 1715 wrecks much. I found this years ago right near the stairs that used to go up to the old Chuck’s Steakhouse building. There was a tropical storm going by at the time. I cant remember which one, but that same day I found a couple ½ reales in the same area and no junk to speak of. There are no markings at all on this. Just thought it might be something of interest if that subject ever comes up again. |
Those kinds of rings have been made and used for a long time. It could be old. It is similar to a design known as the Trinity Knot, which, according to Wikipedia was "designed to honour the Mother, Maiden ad Crone of the Neo-pagan Triple Goddess, which represents the three life-cycles of a woman in relation to the phases of the moon. In modern times, it has come to represent the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.." I've also seen similar rings referred to as a Celtic Trinity knot.
Similar intertwined rings are still made today. You can find quite a variety on the internet. I've seen them and found intertwined rings with both two and three loops. I think they are sometimes referred to as Russian rolling rings. In mathematic terms such a ring might be referred to as a Borromean ring (See Wikipedia again.).
Intertwined rings can't be dated by the design alone. Similar rings have been used from ancient times to the present. You certainly might expect a modern silver ring to be marked. Al's is not.
One of the top 1715 Fleet treasure hunters, who undoubtedly knows as well as about anyone in the world, says that silver rings are not found on 1715 Fleet wreck sites. Kathleen Deagan, in her book Artifacts of the Spanish Colonies of Florida and the Caribbean 1500 to 1800 does show a silver Claddagh ring, which in her book is said to be from the 1715 Fleet. It could be from the 1715 Fleet, but you can't be sure of that without additional evidence. Context is not always enough. It wasn't long ago that I showed a 1968 class ring found by a Capitana diver searching the 1715 Fleet this year. Obviously it wasn't from the 1715 Fleet.
My personal conclusion is that there might be a few (very few) silver rings from the 1715 Fleet, but they are evidently rare. Deagan's book shows many more copper alloy rings from the colonies, along with gold rings and numerous rings made of other substances, including glass and jet. Only a very few are silver. One silver ring that Deagan shows is from a mission site. Although it appears there are some examples, it seems to me that the vast majority of rings in Spanish colonial America were not silver.
There is still a lot left to learn. That is part of the fun of it all.
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I heard that after reassigning a sports announcer named Robert Lee who was going to work a Virginia game, they are now going to remove a duck named Donald from all the parks. Just kidding, but that isn't much more crazy than the Robert Lee thing, which is real and was followed by a decrease of more than a dollar per share for Disney stock. No wonder ESPN is going down the drain.
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I posted a new poll on the blog. I hope you'll respond. We'll find out what kind of detector people are using these days.
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I also heard from people that were glad to see the YouTube videos that I made.
Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
