Over the course of eight decades, at least 14 separate hoards of Iron Age metalwork have been recovered from a single field at Snettisham in Norfolk. Now, following the publication of a new book describing the excavation, conservation, and scientific investigation of these spectacular finds, Jody Joy and Julia Farley describe how they came to be discovered, and reveal some of the secrets that have come to light since then.
Ken Hill, near the village of Snettisham in north west Norfolk, is a special place. This promontory overlooking the Wash is a conspicuous feature in an otherwise flat and marshy coastal landscape, commanding views across the North Sea. It sits close to the Crown’s estates at Sandringham, and over the last few hundred years the land has been used for grazing, arable farming, and shooting. Some 2,000 years ago, however, the slopes of this hill saw the deposition of some of the most ornate ancient metalwork found in Britain: a series of gold hoards that lay largely undisturbed as the world moved on around them, until a chance discovery in the mid-20th century.
On a cold November day in 1948, a young tractor driver, Raymond Williamson, was working on the slopes of Ken Hill when his plough struck something hard. After climbing down to investigate, he retrieved what looked like the remains of an old brass bedstead, threw it to the side of the field, got back on his tractor, and continued with his task. The following day, though, he found more old metal, this time a ‘lot of twisted wire’. Again, no one thought much of the finds, and Williamson probably forgot all about them until a local company owner became interested, and they eventually came to the attention of Roy Rainbird Clarke, the Curator of Archaeology at Norwich Castle Museum. Clarke rushed to investigate – fighting transport delays and road closures because of a freezing fog that had descended over much of eastern Britain – and soon realised that Williamson’s discarded find was no bedstead. The ‘brass bed fittings’ were actually more than 2,000 years old and they were made not of brass, but gold. In fact, they were neck rings that would have been worn by people during the later Iron Age unknown to him at the time, Raymond Williamson had stumbled on one of the most important archaeological sites in Britain.
A GIFT THAT KEPT ON GIVING
Despite its significance, Williamson’s find was just one of a series made at Snettisham over the next 70 years. The first came just two years later in 1950, when another ploughman, Tom Rout, unearthed a beautiful golden torc (now known as the ‘Great Torc’) with intricately decorated terminals. Legend has it that George VI was staying at the nearby Sandringham estate at the time, and the artefact was taken by the landowner to be admired by the king.
There were only infrequent finds through the 1960s and 1970s, and it was thought there were no more treasures to be found at the site, but in August 1990 a metal-detectorist named Cecil ‘Charles’ Hodder once again struck gold. This time, it wasn’t the finely wrought torc that Hodder had perhaps been hoping for when he gained permission to detect at the site; rather, he recovered more than 500 fragmentary objects in alloys of gold, silver, and bronze, a group that we now know had originally been buried in an upturned bronze helmet (of which, more below). Hodder reported his discovery to the Norfolk Archaeological Unit and, soon after, in December that year, a second archaeologist and his team returned to investigate. Dr Ian Stead, then Deputy Keeper of the Department of Prehistoric and Romano-British Antiquities at the British Museum, began a large-scale excavation that lasted for three successive seasons between 1990 and 1992, uncovering several more hoards, as well as evidence about the longer history of the site.
Subsequent excavations and surveys in the 2000s and 2010s have added to this picture, and, in all, more than 1,200 metal artefacts have been found from this single field – which perhaps inevitably became known as the ‘gold field’, owing to the material from which many of the objects had been made. Now residing in the British Museum and Norwich Castle Museum, they include gold, silver, and bronze neck rings, bracelets, rings, and ingots, as well as coins. Together, they have often been labelled the ‘Snettisham Treasure’ (see CA 126 and CA 135), though in fact the deposits consist of at least 14 separate hoards, which have been labelled alphabetically in the order of their discovery.
What can be said about the place where these objects were committed to the soil? Two thousand years ago, at the time the hoards were buried, sea levels were higher and Ken Hill was surrounded by open water on three sides. The southern edge of the hoard field sloped away, down to salt marsh and ultimately the sea. There had been occasional occupation here for thousands of years, but around 2,500 years ago it began to take on a special significance, perhaps becoming a sacred place, with evidence for feasting, and a system of ditches and enclosures that would have channelled movement across the site.
The surrounding area was a well populated, settled landscape. Like today, there were busy farmsteads all along this part of the Norfolk coast. The chalk uplands provided good grazing for sheep and cattle, and the fen edge was rich in resources such as wildfowl, salt, and reeds for thatch and other crafts. The people who lived there were also well connected over land and across the Wash to other regions of Britain, and via the North Sea to the Continent. The torc hoards were most likely buried around 60 BC, but Ken Hill seems to have remained important into the early Roman period, when the ‘gold field’ was partially enclosed by the digging of deep V-shaped ditches, and a square stone structure that may be a Romano Celtic temple was constructed too. Ultimately, however, this prestige faded. The site was abandoned, and the ditches partially filled in, some time in the mid-4th century AD.
Investigating Snettisham
Over the years, the remarkable discoveries from Ken Hill have made headline news and the objects themselves have long been on public display. Yet, although Clarke and Stead both promptly published their excavations, there has never been a comprehensive publication of the site. Over a decade ago, staff at the British Museum set out to address this, undertaking a systematic scientific investigation of the objects, as well as re-examining all the evidence compiled over the years through excavation and archaeological survey. The result is a comprehensive book which aims to make sense of this extraordinary site (see ‘Further reading’ on p.25), and what follows is an account of some of the most spectacular and interesting findings that have emerged.
Let’s start with the most impressive objects from Snettisham, the finds that make the site so exceptional: the torcs. These are metal neck-rings, sometimes with decorated terminals at the front. Similar objects were worn across much of Europe, but the number found at Snettisham is unprecedented. There are more than 60 complete or near-complete torcs from the site, with hundreds more represented by fragments. This compares to 85 or so examples known from the whole of the rest of Britain. Taking all 14 hoards together, it is the largest assemblage of ancient gold jewellery from anywhere in Europe.
Most of the Snettisham torcs were probably made in Britain, but the gold is likely to have been imported from the Continent. Colour was evidently important in the selection of alloys and surface treatments, with precious metal torcs being made in a wide range of alloys combining gold, silver, and copper, and the shade of objects varying from a deep yellow gold to very pale, whitish silver. Some bronze torcs from the site were even gilded with mercury to give them a golden surface appearance: the earliest-known example of this technology in Britain.
Scientific analysis carried out by British Museum scientists including Caroline Cartwright, Nigel Meeks, Aude Mongiatti, and Dan O’Flynn has revealed the extraordinary skill of the metalworkers and the huge variety of materials and manufacturing techniques used in the production of these objects, using gold sheet, twisted wires, and cast components. In their investigation, the scientists worked closely with a modern-day metalworker, John Fenn, who attempted to replicate how these wires would have been made. It was a time-consuming and highly skilled process, with each wire hammered out from an ingot by hand. Depending on the desired form, wires were then twisted or coiled together to form the neck-ring. John found that in order to twist the wires together evenly they had to be of a very similar diameter, something that is extremely difficult to achieve by hand.
When the scientists examined broken wires in cross-section using an electron microscope, they noticed that some were richer in gold and silver at the surface and more copper-rich at the core. This is known as surface enrichment. By following John Fenn at work, the scientists showed how ancient wire manufacturing techniques changed the colour of the original alloy, making wires appear more silvery or golden. This was achieved through repeated phases of hammering and heating. After hammering the metal for some time, John found it became brittle and difficult to work, but this was remedied by periodically heating the wire, and then dipping it in a strong vinegar mix to remove any tarnish. The scientists were able to demonstrate that, through this process, copper was also removed, so privileging gold and silver and ‘enriching’ the surface.
This is an extract of an article that appeared in CA 418. Read on in the magazine, or click here to read it online at The Past, where you can read all of the Current Archaeology articles in full as well as the content of our other magazines, Current World Archaeology, Ancient Egypt, and Military History Matters.
