A pot full of gold coins has been uncovered underneath a house in an ancient city in Turkey.
Every now and then, an incredible archaeological discovery leaves people stunned. Whether it’s an unlikely location, such as the missing Portuguese shipwreck found in a southwest African desert containing $13 million worth of gold coins , or the sheer size, like the largest golden nugget ever found .
A new find came in the city of Notion, an ancient Greek city in western modern-day Turkey, where a pot of gold coins was found underneath a room in the old home.
The coins featured the image of a crouched archer – a design element signalling they were coins once issued by the Persian Empire.
In terms of history, the clues point towards the coins being struck at some point during the fifth century B.C. Experts are using this theory to help determine the events that could have led to the burial of the treasure, with one suggestion that mercenaries took the hoard as payment.
A statement from the University of Michigan explained that the coins were likely minted in Sardis, an ancient city 60 miles northeast of Notion.
“The discovery of such a valuable find in a controlled archaeological excavation is very rare,” Christopher Ratté, a professor of ancient Mediterranean art and archaeology at the University of Michigan and director of the Notion Archaeological Survey , explained. “No one ever buries a hoard of coins, especially precious metal coins, without intending to retrieve it. So only the gravest misfortune can explain the preservation of such a treasure.”
He added: “This hoard will provide a firm date that can serve as an anchor to help fix the chronology of the (sequence of coins),” Ratté said. “According to the Greek historian Xenophon, a single daric was equivalent to a soldier’s pay for one month.”
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