12/25/19 Report - Merry Christmas: Art of Treasuring. Princely Bronze Age Treasures Discovered. Seagrape Trail.

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

Source: Edition.CNN.com link below.

(CNN) Archaeologists in Greece have discovered two "princely" Bronze Age tombs containing engraved gold jewelry and other artifacts.

The discovery of the beehive-shaped tombs, which date from 3,500 years ago, sheds new light on life in ancient Greece, the team behind the excavation said...

During an 18-month excavation, the archaeologists unearthed objects such as a gold ring engraved with two bulls surrounded by sheaves of grain, as well as a gold pendant depicting an Egyptian goddess who protected the dead...

Here is the link for more about that.  

https://edition.cnn.com/2019/12/18/world/archaeologists-royal-tombs-greece-scli-intl-scn/index.html

  

Thanks to SuperRick for that link.

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Super Viral YouTube Video You Must See If You Haven't Already.

Here is the link.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdDCNAXqjMc

So what does that have to do with metal detecting, you might ask.  It is the essence.   The video teaches an important lesson.  Treasure doesn't have to be gold or silver.  It doesn't even have to be worth much of anything.  Treasure is different things to different people.  Treasure can come in many different forms.  No matter what the form, the important thing is that it gives joy.  Some people find treasure everywhere.  Others can't find it anywhere - even if you dump a pile of it in their lap.  Instead of joy, they turn to selfish greed, suspicion, anxiety, fear and anger, and are more bitter and sour than before.

I call it the art of treasuring.  Some people have it and others don't.  You can treasure family, other people, experiences, memories, coins, sea glass, fossils or shells - and even bananas.

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Seagrape Trail Beach on 12/24/19

Photo by DJ.

DJ said that with the exception of one low spot, it was sandy.

You can probably see the low spot just above the center of the photo.   That is an area where shell piles often occur, and where you can sometimes find shark teeth.

Thanks for the report DJ.

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Source: MagicSeaWeed.com.

It was raining on the Treasure Coast earlier.

It looks like we'll have some pretty good surf today.

I MIGHT get out to see one or two beaches for a short time.

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Use treasure as a verb as often as a noun.  When "treasure" is a verb, the power is in the person.

Matthew 6:21 For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. 

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Wishing you once again a great Christmas.
From the TreasureGuide@comcast.net

10/24/19 Report,- The Havering Hoard. Wood Find. Wheat Cents. About Cleaning Coins.

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

Source: BBC.com (See link below.)

The group of 453 artefacts found in Havering, east London, is the third largest ever discovered in the UK...

The find, which dates from between 800BC and 900BC, was officially declared treasure by a coroner earlier this year.

The discovery, dubbed the Havering Hoard, was uncovered last September, and will form the centrepiece of a major exhibition from April.

Archaeologists believed the manner in which the weapons had been so carefully buried in groups close together suggested the site could have been a metal workers' former vault or an armoury recycling bank or exchange...

Here is the link for the rest of the article.

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-50097646

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Wood Found by DJ Sunday

Find and photo by DJ

DJ said, "... it has several round holes and pieces of metal showing. The close up shows two pieces with the wood grain running at right angles."

Interesting.
--- I've mentioned recently about finding a wheat penny in change received at a Walmart a couple days ago. I was surprised to get another wheat penny in change just yesterday at a store about 20 miles away from the Walmart. That is two wheats in my last two shopping trips. Pretty unusual. Below are the two wheats I received in change. The one most recently received is on the right.

Two Wheat Pennies Recently Received in Change.

In a recent post I mentioned a few ways I think old coins end up in circulation. I thought of one more. Spome of the members of CoinCommunity.com mentioned that they sometimes return coins like that to circulation just to stimulate interest in the hobby. The coins shown above appear to me to have been harshly cleaned. You'll notice the very bright high spots that look like they have been really scrubbed. The 1950 D is in worse condition with surface pitting and also a strange patina on the depressed surfaces. It also has some green crud in tight protected areas. You can see that best in the photo on the right behind Lincoln's collar. In my opinion, it does not look like these coins were not owned by a serious collector, but perhaps dug. I doubt that any kind of serious collector would so harshly clean the coins. The one on the right with the surface pitting definitely looks like a dug coin to me. What do you think? Having received two wheats in change in such a short time span makes me wonder if there were a lot of wheats recently put into circulation by someone. Seems pretty unlikely to be coincidence, but it is possible I guess. If you are wondering how often it might happen by chance, I found a blog post where a fellow purchased 48 rolls of pennies in 2014 and recorded what he found. Here is what he said. I went to the bank and got $24 worth of pennies (48 rolls of 50) and sorted them.  On average there were 13.4 pre-1982 pennies in each roll, in percentage terms, 28.4%.  Some had as many as 20 and some had as few as 7.  There were also 5 wheat sheaf pennies in the lot and 10 Canadian cents.

Since that was done five years ago the odds might have changed some.

Anyhow the odds of finding a wheat cent in circulation, according to the experiment, is 5 in 2400 or 1 in 480 pennies.  Canadian cents were more likely than the wheat cents at a that time.  I understand that Canada no longer mints pennies.

Here is the link to that article. http://mattbussey.com/how-many-pre-1982-copper-pennies-are-still-in-circulation/ Here is an article about cleaning coins. Among other things, it tells how to tell if a coin has been cleaned, which they say should almost never be done.

Here is how they say you can tell if a coin has been cleaned.

A cleaned coin will have a dull, bright look – one that on a well-circulated coin would seem unnatural.

Old pennies that have been worn should not look bright orange and have flashy surfaces. Old, worn pennies should be medium to dark brown in color and have virtually no reflectivity on the surface at all. 

Old silver coins will look grey in color with darker patination around the devices, such as the lettering, date, and main design elements. A flashy, white silver coin that has clearly been worn is a clear giveaway that it has been cleaned. 

Uncirculated or about uncirculated coins should have lustrous surfaces and radiating lines that reflect shimmers of light in a cartwheel pattern as the coin is turned or rotated. 

The luster of a cleaned coin will be severely impaired, if not lost altogether. Therefore, if an uncirculated coin has been cleaned, the best way to tell is to see if it has any cartwheel luster. If it doesn’t, then don’t buy the coin.

Older coins that have been cleaned in the past may show evidence of a past cleaning in a few key ways:

Crud around design elements and lettering
Evidence of heavy, dark toning on some parts of the coin but not on others
Dull appearance in the fields

Here are a few occasions when they say it might be advisable to clean a coin.

(1) The coin has ugly and potentially damaging green polyvinylchloride (PVC) goo from an old plastic coin holder.

(2) The coin has loose dirt and debris on it. 

(3) An ancient coin needs cleaning for proper attribution or identification.

Here is that link.
https://coins.thefuntimesguide.com/cleaned-coins/ ---

Source: nhc.noaa.gov

Not much going on except for one undeveloped system down in the Gulf.

Source: MagicSeaWeed.com

Not much surf in the forecast either. Happy hunting, TreasureGuide@comcast.net

10/24/18 Report - Dog Island Shipwrecks Surface After Hurricane as Expected. Bronze Age Dagger Found. Martyrs of North America.

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

Dog Island Shipwreck Uncovered by Hurricane Michael.

On 10/11/18 I posted the following.

As you know by now, the portions of the Florida Panhandle got hit hard by Hurricane Michael.  I have not doubt that some old things will be uncovered up around Alligator Point and Dog Island, where nice old Spanish coins have been found before.

If you want to become a little more familiar with the shipwrecks of the area, here is a link to a lengthy and  detailed archaeological report.

You will find a lot of interesting information in that report.

Some of the uncovered wrecks, such as the one or two shown above are now in the news.

It looks like that photo was taken by a drone.

An article in TampaBay.com published the photo at the top of the post and said, But among the destruction is also a reemergence of history.  The storm's surge unearthed a shipwreck from the 19th century, one or possibly two sunken ships that were washed up on Dog Island by a 1899 hurricane.  According to Sarah Revell, spokeswoman for the Department of State, the wrecks "have been mapped and investigated scientifically multiple times," and parts of them have been exposed in the past.

Here is the link for the rest of that article.

http://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2018/10/23/hurricane-michael-unearthed-a-19th-century-shipwreck-on-dog-island/

I also recommend reading the extensive archaeological report, if you haven't already done that.

Other sources also talked about Dog Island shipwrecks exposed by hurricane Michael.  The following appeared in MyFox8.com.

Here is the link for more about that.

https://myfox8.com/2018/10/20/hurricane-michael-exposes-120-year-old-shipwrecks-off-florida-coast/

Thanks to TekLord Doug for the lead on these articles.

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Bronze Age Dagger.

Source: Spectator.sme.sk

Here is an excerpt from an article about another interesting find.

A local man has found a unique Bronze Age dagger on the banks of the Slanec stream in Hriňová. The dagger is probably between 3200 and 3600 years old. More specific data will be available after more detailed research by preservation offices.

“It is the oldest finding from the area around our town and may reveal significant new historical connections to the region,” said the Hriňová project manager, Michal Machava, as quoted by the TASR newswire...

Here is the link for more about that.


https://spectator.sme.sk/c/20940695/bronze-age-dagger-unearthed.html

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Here is an excerpt from an interesting article about martyrs of North America.

In the summer of 1642, Jogues and the surgeon-turned-Jesuit brother, St. René Goupil, were accompanying a large group of Huron warriors homeward when they were ambushed by Mohawks (part of the Iroquois Confederacy) at Lake Champlain. Many died, but the rest were taken prisoner, with Jogues and Goupil among them. Both were victims of torture and Jogues had most of his fingers cut off. Goupil was martyred shortly after professing his religious vows in the presence of Jogues for teaching a small boy the Sign of the Cross. Commenting on this, Jogues wrote, “this angel of innocence and martyr of Jesus Christ gave his life for him who had given him his.”

And here is that link.

https://www.osv.com/Article/TabId/493/ArtMID/13569/ArticleID/20406/North-American-Martyrs.aspx

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Friend, physician and detectorist Russ P. confirms that the Red Tide that has been plaguing our beaches does cause coughing.  I understand that if you have asthma, it could be dangerous.

There are no storms in the Atlantic.

A cool front came through last night with some northeast winds.  I haven't seen the beaches yet.

Happy hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net

7/1/18 Report - Farmer Finds Gold Digging Drain. Some Say Cape Canaveral Shipwreck Likely Trinite. Shipwreck Site Sampling Plan.

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

Norman Witherow uncovered the gold objects on Saturday when he was digging a drain in a field near Convoy.

The artefacts remained in his kitchen and car boot until Tuesday when his friend, who is a jeweller, told him that it needed to be reported.

Initial observations by staff from the National Museum of Ireland date the gold from the bronze age or earlier.

Here is the link for the rest of the story.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44644347


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Chuck Meide of LAMP recently wrote in the St. Augustine Report about the GME discovery of the shipwreck near Cape Canaveral that I recently posted about on 6/25/18.  Meide thought it was almost certainly the Trinite, one of Ribault’s 1565 shipwreck.  Anyhow, it appears the case is closed and the shipwreck will be the property of France.

In the report Meide states,  We led a search for Ribault’s wrecks in 2014 in the waters of Canaveral National Seashore, near the French survivor camp sites on land. This was probably in the vicinity of the other three shipwrecks, as opposed to Trinité further south. NOAA helped fund our research, as did the State of Florida...  In addition to all of these searches, the State of Florida also led a marine survey searching for the remains of the Trinité, around Cape Canaveral, starting in 2014. They were probably pretty close to the site discovered by GME.

To sum that up, a lot of tax payer dollars went to organizations that failed to find the Trinite, but a private company without tax dollar support, Global Marine Explorations, actually found it.  Never mind, GME will get totally cut out of the deal so state employees, and their contractor friends can get the credit and more trips to Paris.

Here is the link for more of that article.

http://staugustinereport.net/index_htm_files/Trinite.pdf

Like I've said multiple times, I'll be very surprised if Florida ever issues a new treasure salvage lease.

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Source:: See link below.

You might find the following interesting.  It is, A STRATIFIED SITE SAMPLING RESEARCH PLAN FOR THE 2005-2006 INVESTIGATIONS AND RECOVERY AT NORTH CAROLINA ARCHAEOLOGICAL SHIPWRECK SITE 31CR314 Mark Wilde-Ramsing, May, 2006.


 Introduction: North Carolina shipwreck site 31CR314 has been under investigation since its discovery in 1996 and continues to reveal a rich assemblage of early 18th century maritime cultural materials. The analysis of datable artifacts that have been collected from the site provides a mean date of manufacture of 1706 with predominately French and English affiliation (Wilde-Ramsing 2006). Ship's features reveal a vessel of 200 to 300 tons (Moore 2001; 2006). Armament represented on the site is equivalent to that of a Royal Navy Sixth Rate warship, while the presence of langrel shot in one of the small caliber guns suggests a predator or heavily armed merchantman rather than a Royal Navy warship (Henry 2006)...

This is about shipwreck sites and artifact distribution.

Here is the link.

https://files.nc.gov/dncr-qar/documents/files/32-Spring-2006-Recovery-Plan.pdf

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This feels unfinished.  I might rework or add to it tomorrow, but decided to go ahead and post it now.

Happy hunting,
Treasureguide@comcast.net