East Bohemian Museum
Archaeologists in the East Bohemian announced the casual discovery of a rare treasure near the city of Trutnov in the northeast of the country. Hidden in a forest, the 7 kg treasure includes almost 4 kg of gold coins worth over 300,000 euros.
A quiet walk on the slopes of Hill ZVIčina, at the foot of the Krkonoše mountains in the Czech Republic, near the border with Poland, became an extraordinary discovery to two mountaineers with luck, who found a hidden treasureevaluated in more than 7.5 million checked crowns – about 300.000 euros.
On the edge of an old field, now covered with trees, the two tourists began by finding an aluminum container with almost 600 gold coinscarefully organized in eleven batteries wrapped in black fabric.
A little distance, They found then an iron box with sixteen cigarettes, ten bracelets, a wire bag, a comba current and a compact powder – all made of yellow metal.
The total weight of the objects found reaches 7kg. The nearly 600 coins weigh more than half: 3.7 kilograms of gold.
The finding, which occurred in early February, was now announced by the East Bohemian Museum, whose experts They are still trying to understand How this valuable collection came to be buried in this place.
What the archaeologists could so far as to find out was that the treasure was hidden after 1921 – the latest date in the coins found.
“The list of possible reasons for which the treasure was buried is quite clear. It was the beginning of the war, the Deportation of Czech and Jewish populationsthen the deportation of the Germans after the war, so there are several possibilities, ”explains Miroslav Novák, director of the Czech Museum Archeology Department.
“There was also a monetary reform at the time, which may also have been a reason,” adds the archaeologist, quoted by.
According to Novák, the original owner of the mysterious treasure seems to have buried him in a place where I could find it later. However, your identity and reason why it was never recovered remain a mystery.
What is clear is that main motivation to hide the treasure It was precious metal, particularly gold. “It was not the nominal value of the currencies, if they were worth 5, 10 or 100 crowns. This is not what they could buy – that was not what mattered. It was deliberately hidden because it was precious metal”Says the museum numisma, Vojtěch Brádle.
After a more detailed analysis of the finding, the numbers found that most coins are French, Turkish, Belgian and Austro-Hungarianalong with some coins of Romania, Italy and Russia.
When examining small marks in the coins, they also determined that the Austro-Hungarian coinsthey were intended for the bohemianbut probably to the area of ancient Yugoslavia, such as Serbia or Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“At some point after 1921, they must have been reemed in local coin houses and only later, in unknown circumstances, They arrived from ancient Yugoslavia to what is today the Czech Republic, ”explains Brádle.
Archaeologists hope that with the help of file records, they can now unravel the story behind the mysterious treasure hidden under the hill of ZVIčina.
