[meteorite-list] OT - Gold Hoard Found in England

From: Sterling K. Webb <sterling_k_webb_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Fri, 25 Sep 2009 13:45:58 -0500
Message-ID: <E832EE9B568B4690A4EF72844B7DBE7E_at_ATARIENGINE2>

Photos of the Gold Hoard:
http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/09/24/staffordshire.uk.gold.hoard/index.html#cnnSTCPhoto


Sterling K. Webb
-------------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Greg Hupe" <gmhupe at htn.net>
To: "Sterling K. Webb" <sterling_k_webb at sbcglobal.net>; "dean bessey"
<deanbessey at yahoo.com>; <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Friday, September 25, 2009 1:30 PM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] OT - Gold Hoard Found in England


> Hello All who commented on the Gold Hoard,
>
> I appreciate all of the comments and contributions of British law
> regarding this find, and others. From what I have heard of past
> British finds and of this one, I look forward to hearing of the finder
> and property owner's payday, which I am sure will be the case. Britain
> does seem to have their laws tailored to be the advantage to all
> involved, everyone benefits! I agree that the treasure should go to
> the museums, but also strongly believe that the finder needs to be
> fairly compensated for their efforts and private funds to conduct such
> hunts. Without the private sector spending untold millions of dollars
> per year in search of treasure and other items throughout the world,
> there would be much less cultural and historic items to be shared with
> the world. Sadly, in many cases, we hear of countries legally
> 'stealing' (as Dean commented) private hunters finds. These countries
> and their broad-reaching laws create the black market instead of
> penning fair laws which benefit everyone.
>
> If anyone goes to view these items, I would like to see some photos if
> possible. That, or if a web site is created, please send a link.
> Thanks!
>
> Best regards,
> Greg
>
> ====================
> Greg Hupe
> The Hupe Collection
> NaturesVault (eBay)
> gmhupe at htn.net
> www.LunarRock.com
> IMCA 3163
> ====================
> Click here for my current eBay auctions:
> http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZnaturesvault
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sterling K. Webb" <sterling_k_webb at sbcglobal.net>
> To: "dean bessey" <deanbessey at yahoo.com>;
> <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
> Sent: Friday, September 25, 2009 12:15 AM
> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] OT - Gold Hoard Found in England
>
>
>> Dean,
>>
>> The old English Common Law is that a Tresure Trove is
>> buried gold or silver that was being hidden or "banked"
>> and was meant to be recovered later and is presumed to
>> be so old that the owner and any known desecendents are
>> dead. It becomes the property of the Crown, just as
>> abandoned bank accounts become the property of the
>> state unless claimed by the owner or an heir. Just
>> finding it is not enough to claim it. (Scotland and Wales
>> have their own common law provisions.)
>>
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treasure_trove#United_Kingdom
>> details the Treasure Act of 1996, which generously broadens
>> and re-defines legal "treasure" as the property of the Crown.
>> If the treasure is to be transferred to a museum (as this will)
>> the Secretary of State is "required to determine whether a
>> reward should be paid by the museum before the transfer to
>> the finder or any other person involved in the finding of the
>> treasure, the occupier of the land at the time of the find, or
>> any person who had an interest in the land at the time of the
>> find or has had such an interest at any time since then. If the
>> Secretary of State determines that a reward should be paid,
>> he or she must also determine the market value of the treasure
>> (assisted by the Treasure Valuation Committee), the amount
>> of the reward (which cannot exceed the market value), to whom
>> the reward should be paid and, if more than one person should
>> be paid, how much each person should receive."
>>
>> For example, the huge find at Sutton Hoo was NOT a treasure
>> trove because there was no intention to recover it -- they were
>> grave goods. In March 1973, a hoard of 7,811 Roman coins was
>> found buried in a field at Coleby in Lincolnshire. It was made
>> up of antoniniani believed to have been minted between 253
>> and 281 A.D. The Court of Appeal of England and Wales held
>> in the 1981 case of Attorney-General of the Duchy of Lancaster
>> v. G.E. Overton (Farms) Ltd. that the hoard was not treasure
>> trove as the coins did not have a substantial silver content.
>> Thus, it belonged to the owner of the field... (Note: the
>> antoniniani was originally a silver coin valued at two denarii
>> but with only 1.5 denarii worth of silver in it; the rest was
>> bronze. It was "inflation money." The Empire kept adding more
>> bronze in place of silver until it was worthless. But if you find
>> 7800 of 'em, let me know.)
>>
>> One hopes that the reward intentions of the Crown are
>> generous, but there seem to be no guarantees in the law.
>> There don't seem to be bones with this "treasure," so the
>> finders can't argue that it was, like Sutton Hoo, grave goods.
>> It seems to be a clear-cut case of "hoard." I suspect the
>> general elation over the find will incline government to
>> reward the finders. Failure to do so would incline future
>> finders to loot sites and that's the last thing they want.
>> On the black market, this find would be evaluated at a
>> worth of tens of millions.
>>
>>
>> Sterling K. Webb
>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "dean bessey" <deanbessey at yahoo.com>
>> To: <meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com>
>> Sent: Thursday, September 24, 2009 10:10 PM
>> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] OT - Gold Hoard Found in England
>>
>>
>> Well, I am not that up on british law and maybe there is a british
>> legal clause that the guys dont own it. That is however different
>> from what the article says as it clearly says that they will split
>> the proceeds (Not that reporters always get the details right when it
>> comes to value).
>> It is also contrary to what my friends who are coin and artifact
>> dealers have to say about british cultural property laws. Most of
>> them are quite happy with how the british handle things and you never
>> hear stories about how they got screwed by the cultural property
>> department (Compare what people have to say about britain to what
>> they say about canadian cultural property laws for example).
>> Maybe though you are right and that these guys will in fact not get a
>> cent. I am not a lawyer. But I am leaning toward thinking that they
>> will get a fair shake come payoff time. But if I am wrong and these
>> guys do get their loot legally stolen from them by the government you
>> can bet that the next gold stash that is found wont end up being
>> studied and on public display but will discreetly get sent to
>> switzerland shaped as not so small shiney cubes.
>> My bet is that the guys running the cultural property system in
>> britian is smarter than that.
>> Cheers
>> DEAN
>>
>> --- On Thu, 9/24/09, ensoramanda at ntlworld.com
>> <ensoramanda at ntlworld.com> wrote:
>>
>>> From: ensoramanda at ntlworld.com <ensoramanda at ntlworld.com>
>>> Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] OT - Gold Hoard Found in England
>>> To: meteorite-list at meteoritecentral.com
>>> Date: Thursday, September 24, 2009, 3:46 PM
>>> Hi Greg, Dean, All,
>>>
>>> This amazing hoard was found just a short distance away
>>> from me near a place called Brownhills at the side of the
>>> A5. Lots of discussion about its value on the news as usual.
>>> I think that in this case it will be classed as treasure as
>>> it was deliberately hidden ( I think the law is different if
>>> it is classed as lost ) and will not belong to the landowner
>>> or the finder, so will not be sold but go to the museums.
>>> Once valued their will be a reward allocated which in this
>>> case will belong to the finder as he got permission to
>>> search from the landowner. Apparently he has agreed to share
>>> that with the landowner...which only seems fair.
>>>
>>> I intend to visit the museum in Birmingham over the weekend
>>> to see this exciting historical find right on my doorstep.
>>>
>>> Graham Ensor, UK
>>>
>>>
>>> ---- dean bessey <deanbessey at yahoo.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> > > From: Greg Hupe <gmhupe at htn.net>
>>> > >
>>> > > think also that the true story is all about good
>>> luck and
>>> > > the willingness to get permission and agreements
>>> from
>>> > > property owners!
>>> > >
>>> > It is more than that. It is also an example of common
>>> sense historical artifact laws at work. Britain has
>>> constructed their artifact laws in such a way that it is in
>>> a finders best interest to report all of their findings (It
>>> is also illegal to not report your findings but that dont
>>> really give you much incentive and wont work anyway).
>>> > As a result whenever artifact or coin hoards get found
>>> in UK everybody who is interested gets to study them and
>>> learn as much history as possible from the stash. And the
>>> actual finder gets more money for them than if he tried to
>>> sell them in secret on the UNESCO black market (Probably has
>>> to pay taxes on the sale of the hoard also). Finder,
>>> science, general public, government, land owners - everybody
>>> wins with british cultural property laws.
>>> > If this stash of gold was found in Italy, Israel,
>>> Egypt or Peru, the site would have been very quickly
>>> destroyed behond recognition and reburied (After dark and
>>> probably all in one night) to hide any evidence of the sites
>>> existance, and the gold melted down, stamped Johnson matthey
>>> and (With the governments full blessing) shipped out of the
>>> country.
>>> > Rather than being studied by researchers as this hoard
>>> will be, it would have gone on the next fed ex flight out
>>> and went directly from the archaeological site to a swiss
>>> bank vault.
>>> > It would have been UNESCO at work
>>> > Sincerely
>>> > DEAN
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
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>>
>>
>>
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Received on Fri 25 Sep 2009 02:45:58 PM PDT