4/3/19 Report - Lead Seal Finds. 1715 Fleet (?) Wax Seal Find. Info on Sounding Weights. Cleaning Lead Artifacts.

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

The Nathan-Melech/Eved Hamelech seal found in the City of David.
(Photo Credit: Eliyahu Yanai, City of David)

Archaeologists in Israel have discovered a rare clay seal mark and a 2,600-year-old stone stamp bearing Biblical names amid the ruins of a building destroyed by the ancient Babylonians...

The tiny 1 cm seal stamp has been dated to sometime from the middle of the seventh century to the start of the sixth century B.C. Deciphered by Dr. Anat Mendel-Geberovich of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and the Center for the Study of Ancient Jerusalem, the stamp features the words: “(Belonging) to Nathan-Melech, Servant of the King.” In the second book of Kings 23:11 “Nathan-Melech” is described as an official in the court of King Josiah. The seal is described as the first archaeological evidence of the Biblical name...

Here is the link for more about that.

https://www.foxnews.com/science/rare-ancient-treasures-bearing-biblical-names-discovered-in-jerusalems-city-of-david

One of my favorite Treasure Coast finds is a wax seal.  I'm not talking about the seal used to impress a mark in wax, but the actual stamped wax itself.

I found it at the water's edge at Turtle Trail.

The reason I like it so much is the improbability of something as fragile as a small slab of wax surviving hundreds of years on a beach or in the surf.

Unfortunately the design is not clear because of wear and sand impressed into the wax.

Here it is.

It isn't easy to see the design, but there is a bird that looks like an eagle.  On the left photo, the wing is outlined in red.  On the right photo, the head, body and thighs are outlined lightly in red - perhaps too lightly.

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Yesterday I showed Terry's lead sounding weight find.  Lead usually doesn't need much cleaning, however if you want to see the surface, there are some good methods.

The TAMU conservation lab provides detailed instructions for cleaning lead.  Looking at Terry's sounding weight, I don't know how much I'd do to it, but if I wanted to clean it, I'd first look at what could be mechanically removed.  I prefer applying pressure to encrustation instead of strinking it.  A slow increasing pressure will often cause encrustation to crack so it can easily be removed.  Then I might test a little acid and/or electrolysis.

Here is a bit of what the TAMU conservation manual says.

CHEMICAL TREATMENT OF LEAD Because of the ease of treatment and the availability of the chemicals, the most widely used conservation treatment for lead from any archaeological environment is the acid treatment described by Caley (1955). The lead is immersed in 10 percent hydrochloric acid, which will remove any adhering marine encrustation, along with lead carbonates, lead monoxide, lead sulfide, calcium carbonate, and ferric oxide. This treatment is good for lightly corroded specimens, and it gives lead surfaces a pleasing appearance. The surface detail that is preserved by this treatment varies with the degree of corrosion when recovered. For more diagnostic lead artifacts, Caley's method has been superseded by electrolytic reduction, which has the ability to convert mineral products back to a metallic state. For the general cleaning of lead without a lot of hands-on labor, however, Caley's method remains an acceptable and much-used technique, provided that the object is thoroughly rinsed after treatment in order to remove all remaining hydrochloric acid residue...


ELECTROLYTIC REDUCTION CLEANING The ability to control the speed of the electrolytic reaction through current controls makes electrolytic reduction especially useful for lead coins and medals or, indeed, any specimen where surface detail is important or reduction and/or consolidation of the corrosive layers is the objective...  Normal Reduction Lead artifacts with substantial metal remaining can be cleaned by the normal electrolytic reduction process using 5 percent sodium hydroxide, anodes of mild steel or stainless steel, and a current density of 2-5 amps/dm2. Very satisfactory results are achieved by this technique...

With either acid or electrolysis, go very slow and closely monitor the process.

I've discussed and illustrated .electrolysis before

Here is the link to the manual,

http://nautarch.tamu.edu/CRL/conservationmanual/ConservationManual.pdf

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Here is a description of how a sounding weight was used.

Taking soundings, or casts of the lead, is done when the vessel has headway on, the leadsman casting the lead forward and getting the depth as the vessel passes over the lead, resting on the bottom. The method of procedure is as follows:

The leadsman grasps the leadline at the toggle and swings the lead back and forth, parallel with the side of the ship, the leadsman being in a projecting lead stand, or in the chains in a sailing vessel, the lead is sent over head for two full turns and released at the bottom of the swing flying forward at a tangent, and almost parallel with the surface of the water. The motion of the swinging lead is opposite to that of a wheel turning with the motion of the ship. Assuming a right hand throw, from the starboard side, the left hand of the leadsman holds the coils of the line, freely forward, so it can run out without hindrance and without kinks. As the line flows out and the lead reaches the bottom, the leadsman grasps the running line with his right hand and pulls it rapidly plunging it up and down to feel the bottom. Feeling bottom, he plumbs the line up and down as the ship passes by the lead. He bends over and notes the mark above the water. If a mark is directly at the water, he calls out that mark, as "by the Mark five". If slightly under water "Mark underwater, five." If the five is three feet up, ""and a half four", if the five is six feet up," by the deep four." And so on , calling the marks and deeps or the spaces in between. If the mark is seven, for instance, is a quarter fathom out of the water (1.5 ft.) the leadsman would call, "and a quarter less seven." Before the next cast the leadsman will look at the arming and report the state of the bottom and clean the arming for the next cast. This gives you the general idea. The leadsman sings out the marks and deeps. He never uses "sir" as some are apt to do. The soundings should be called out sharp and clear. Leadsmen should practice casting the lead from both starboard and port lead stands...

For more interesting facts, check out this site.

http://www.navyandmarine.org/ondeck/1800soundinglead.htm

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Looks like I won't be able to get out for a few days.  It has been hard sitting out some of these days.  I left a spot half-done  that I badly wanted to finish.

If anyone has beach reports and photos,  I'd like to post them.

Looks like tomorrow the surf will decrease a bit from around three to five feet down a foot or so.

I've received a some thoughts on the gold mystery find that I posted the yesterday.  Still looking for more.  I expect to address that tomorrow.   Thanks to all contributors.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

8/10/12 Report - Another Lead Seal Found & More Weather to Watch.

Written by the treasureguide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.

Find and Photo by William M.

Here is what appears to be another lead seal found by William M.  Another very nice find.  If anyone recognizes the mark, let me know. 

We might be able to see more of the mark if William does a little more cleaning.

Where is the last place you would find a 1909 Lincoln penny.  If you said Mars, that might be a good guess, but it would be wrong.

Curiosity, the rover that was landed on Mars, had a 1909 penny attached for calibrating the camera.

Below is the picture of the penny that went to  Mars.

Thanks to James F. for that link.

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/multimedia/images/?ImageID=3803


A propeller from a WW II US plane was found in a glacier in Switzerland.  \

Here is the link to that article.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/08/09/us-warplane-propeller-switzerland-1946_n_1759968.html?icid=maing-grid10%7Chtmlws-main-bb%7Cdl1%7Csec1_lnk3%26pLid%3D190280

Photo From NASA

We have tropical depression number 7 now. Ernesto has gone its way, and at present it looks like this new one will follow the same path followed by Ernesto.


There is also another one coming off of Africa that already has a 30% chance of forming into a cyclone. Of course, it is too far away to tell any more about it.

The wind is from the southeast and the seas are calm.   We'll have to watch those storms.

Low tide Saturday morning will be around 8:45.


I was finding a lot of encrusted coins this morning.  Maybe more on that tomorrow or some other time.


Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

3/29/12 Report - Gold Chain Bringing Big Bids & Seal Identified

Written by the TreasureGuide for the exclusive use of treasurebeachesreport.blogspot.com.


Olive Blossom Chain from 1715 Fleet.

One item up for sale in the current Sedwick Coins auction already has a bid well over the auction estimate. I can see why. It is one of my favorites of the auction.

The item I am talking about is the long length of the gold "olive blossom" or "dragon whistle" chain from the 1715 Fleet.

The intricate links are obviously handmade because they are all slightly different. The 2-sided links each show 6-petal flowers, and are made of a high-grade gold.

If you've read much about the 1715 Fleet you probably know about the find of the "dragon-whistle" and 11' chain made by Kip Wagner and Rex Stocker in 1962.


Back a few months ago I reported on the September 10, 2011, find of a bronze seal by the the crew of the Magruder on the debris trail of the Atocha. It has been determined that the seal belonged to the most senior military official in the entire fleet, Don Pedro Pasquier y de Esparza.

Seal of Don Pedro Pasquier y de Esparza Found on Trail of Atocha.

Information and photo of the seal was received via email from the Mel Fisher organization.



Here is the story of Black Jack - the pirate, not the card game.

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/13261039/in-search-of-pirate-black-jack/


I just received an email concerning the possible use of a photo posted in this blog from a curriculum developer working with FPAN (Florida Public Archaeology Network). You might find the author's work of interest.

Here is the link.

http://www.fpannortheast.org/coquinaqueries/lessons.cfm


My most recent poll has concluded and the results are in.

Fewer people responded to this poll than the others. The reason is obvious. I didn't have a choice for those who have not found or have not bought or sold treasure coins or artifacts. And that is a very significant number of this blog's readers.

Coins and artifacts are not easy to find, many people have not found their first yet and some never will before giving up. And despite popular characterizations, many that find such items do not buy or sell them. On top of that, beach conditions have more often than not been poor for the last year or two. All of that combined, decreases the number of people that qualify to respond to this poll.

Of the small number that have bought such items, the largest number made their purchase through eBay. Sedwick was close behind, and there were a few purchases from other auction sites.

One thing that should be made clear, that of the purchases reported in the poll, I sincerely doubt that many were rare historically significant high-priced items. It makes much more sense to buy an item like a shipwreck spike from eBay than it does to buy a gold coin from an unknown buyer in China.

I suspect the more valuable items were purchased through Sedwick rather than eBay, since you know Sedwick and their reputation. The poll didn't determine that though.

More people bought items at online auctions than sold these types of items online or offline combined. It is not common for detectorists to hunt these types of items for profit. It is much too difficult, and despite the mischaracterizations you might read, detectorists are not detecting for the profit of it. If it were, most would be found deep in debt and sadly disappointed.


Beach detecting conditions remain poor. The good news is that the seas are low and by Sunday will be nearly flat. That means easy water detecting, even if it isn't real productive.

As I've pointed out, there is a lot of sand on the beach fronts and in the shallow water. You can almost always find a bit of a dip some where though, and there are the modern drops.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

12/28 Report - Seal Ring and Griding

Seal Ring Found with Metal Detector.

I'm still hoping someone might have some ideas about the seal.




As I mentioned some time last week, someone asked me what is the proper way to work a beach. There isn't any one right way, but there are a lot of strategies and methods that apply to different situations.

The dry back beach that has not been affected by moving water for a long time is one situation. The low tide zone that is affected daily by moving water is another.

What you are hunting also makes a difference.

So lets look at one fairly specific situation today. I'll start with one of the easiest.

Assume you heard that a valuable ring has been lost near a volleyball court in front of a hotel. In that case the area to be searched is relatively small and well defined. Unless someone already found it, it is probably buried under a inch or two of sand where it was lost.

In that case you simply want to thoroughly cover the defined area. Mark the corners of the defined area and walk in a straight line back and forth until the entire area has been covered. For those of you who don't already know, that is called griding.

You should realize that the natural tendency is to walk too fast. so that your coil on one sweep leaves some area uncovered between sweeps. You need to keep your sweep pattern tight. In fact it is best to overlap successive sweeps. I've had detectors that I would swear detect a larger area than the size of the coil, but generally speaking, the greatest detecting depth is under the center of the coil, and the area under the edges of the coil do not detect as deeply. Therefore, targets under the edge of the coil could easily be missed if buried even a few inches.

Before starting, check the settings on your detector. Generally I would advise against discrimination. A trash item can cause a detector using discrimination to miss a good item that is either under the trash item or very near to the trash item.

There are situations when discrimination can be helpful, but generally speaking I say to use as little as possible.

One good way to check your settings is to use a test target similar to what you are hunting. Put the test target on the ground. For purposes of selecting your settings, you probably won't have to bury the test target.

Adjust your settings until you get the best response from the test target. It won't matter if you cover every inch of sand and put your coil over the target if your discrimination is too high or the other settings on your detector will not detect the target. Make sure you can detect the target before wasting your time.

You might have to adjust your settings very precisely to easily detect small gold chains or other small gold or platinum items.

If you are looking for small pieces of gold, you certainly don't want much discrimination.

I advise practicing at home with various types of targets so you know what your detector will and will not do with the adjustments set to various settings.

Sweep your coil over the test target at different speeds and adjust your sweep speed until you get the best signal from the test target. Practice that sweep speed and use it during your search.

Again, this is one of the simplest scenarios. Griding is a common technique, but it is important to remember to do it well. Don't get sloppy, don't sweep too fast.
Sweep at the best speed and overlap successive sweeps.

Griding can be used for other situations when you want to cover every square inch, but for other types of hunting it would often not be efficient. There is too much sand and too little time to cover every grain.

It is important to learn where to spend your time. To do that you need to learn to read the beach. I'll talk more about that and other strategies and techniques in the near future.


An article in he New York Times suggests that museums should sponsor and conduct digs.

Here is the link.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/23/opinion/23frischer.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1

I wanted to elaborate on one paragraph of this article.

Sadly, when an object is taken from its original site without documentation, context is lost. And in archaeology, context is everything: it tells us an object’s age, its likely place of manufacture and its everyday use. This lack of information makes it harder for collectors to determine if an object is fake, while even authentic works, in the absence of the context of their discovery, become mute witnesses to our irresponsible acquisitiveness.

The situation beach hunters face is that items found on a beach have no context that would tell you much. A beach by it's nature is a very dynamic system. Things do not stay put. They are washed in and out, and separated from their source and other items that they were originally associated with. You are very fortunate when an object is marked in any way that helps you identify the item.



Forecast and Conditions.

Not much has changed recently and it doesn't look like there will be for the next several days. The surf web site is projecting 2.5 foot seas for that long.

Conditions aren't terrible, but for hunting treasure cobs they are poor. The wind is still out of the north/northwest. It is certainly cold.

I think the beaches are still interesting, but not easy.


Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net