Silver Coins in Swedish Garden

On a quiet day in September 2007, a Swedish gardener dug up a remarkable Viking treasure while he was cultivating vegetables in his garden on the island of Gotland. A province of Sweden, Gotland is the largest of the Baltic islands. Treasure troves were common news in Gotland. During the Viking Age, Gotland was used as a central trading post because of its strategic location between Eastern and Western Europe. There had been up to 800 finds of silver coins reported on the island, mostly Arabic, on the Russian rivers.

In total, the Viking treasure discovered by the gardener comprised of 69 silver coins estimated to be about a thousand years old. Other than some rare primitive Viking currency, there were also what would be currently Irish, German, English, Iraqi and, Uzbekistani currency. Since there had been an earlier Viking treasure of almost the same composition in England, these silver coins illustrated the Vikings' ambitions to extend their influence beyond Europe. It was believed that the Vikings ventured along the Russian rivers to trade with the Middle Easterners to a large degree. This explained the part of the Middle Eastern coins.

In the days when the Vikings roamed across Europe, sometimes, they would be offered some sort of "tribute money", known as danegeld, by some of the weakers rulers so that their lands would not be attacked. The Anglo-Saxon coins could either be danegeld or spoils. Back in those days, the King of England was Ethelred II who ruled from 978 to 1016 AD. Supposedly, he paid a great deal of danegeld to the Vikings and a good number of the silver coins in the garden horde bore his image. More interestingly, there were extremely rare silver coins created for Olof Skötkonung who was known to be the first Swedish king to commission the minting of coins. Since the Vikings received so much danegeld from Ethelred II, the first Viking coins were quite the same as those Anglo-Saxon coins. There were also the coins of Sihtric who was the Viking ruler of Dublin.

Another interesting thing about these silver coins was the proof of "pecking". In those days, it was hard to tell whether a coin was made of real silver or lead. To check the authenticity of the coin, it would be "pecked". As such, it would was rather common to find knife marks on a coin from that time. 

Do you know why the Vikings buried the silver coins in the ground? One theory suggested that there were too much coins going through Gotland so the Vikings cached them in the ground for later use. Another theory speculated that the Vikings buried the silver coins as spiritual deposits for a richer life after death. Well? Don't you go bury your silver now. Be smarter the Vikings! Sell silver and receive cash for silver. Don't worry. Your silver will not be "pecked" as you will receive the best rate for silver by a silver buyer.