A builder is celebrating after finding a huge haul of 1,000-year-old silver coins worth £50,000 - including one from Lincolnshire which experts have never seen before.

Don Crawley, 50, was searching for buried treasure in farmland using his metal detector when he discovered the haul.

The 99 silver coins, which include 81 pennies and 18 cut halfpennies, date back to Anglo Saxon times and the reign of King Ethelred II from 978-1016AD.

Among the haul was one coin from Lincolnshire, which is marked as being from Lude - the Latin name for Louth - despite the town being more than 100 miles away.

It is believed at the time the coin was created, there were a number of mints across the country - meaning Louth had its own mint, which produced its own currency. The coin isthe first example of its kind ever seen by experts.

The discovery was made on farmland in Suffolk and research has established that the site used to be the grounds of a long-forgotten Saxon church.

The coins have been examined by the British Museum and returned to Don as 'finders keepers'.

He has been told he is free to sell the hoard and it has been given a pre-sale estimate of £50,000 with London auctioneers Dix Noonan Webb.

He will split the proceeds with the land owner on a 50/50 basis.

To read the complete article, see:
Metal detectorist finds unique Anglo-Saxon coin from Lincolnshire in£50,000 haul (https://www.lincolnshirelive.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/metal-detectorist-finds-unique-anglo-3354432)