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Finds in Sweden
Photo: Adam Ihse / EPA
This walk in the woods took an unexpected turn.
A hobby cartographer accidentally found a treasure from the Bronze Age that is more than 2500 years old in Sweden.
The approximately 50 pieces of jewelry and other relics are one of the "most spectacular and largest" such finds from the Bronze Age that have ever been made in the northern European country.
The authorities in the city of Alingsas in southwest Sweden announced on Thursday.
Among the finds are some "very well-preserved necklaces and clasps" made of bronze.
The authorities said that the objects were in front of some rocks in a forest.
Animals would probably have dug them up among the rocks.
Tomas Karlsson, who discovered the treasure, initially thought the pieces were rubbish.
"It looked like scrap metal," he told the Dagens Nyheter newspaper. "At first I thought: Is there a lamp there?" Even on closer inspection he was skeptical. "The pieces looked so new. I thought they're fakes, ”Karlsson said, but turned to the local authorities, who sent archaeologists to the site.
"Most of the finds are made of bronze and can be attributed to a woman of high position in society," said Professor Johan Ling from the University of Gothenburg.
In addition to necklaces and bracelets, clasps were found that apparently held woolen clothing together.
Again and again there are comparable finds, but the finders are not always so honest.
In the UK, for example, two amateur treasure hunters were convicted at the end of 2019 for trying to hide the discovery of an approximately 1,100-year-old Viking treasure.
The finds that are now kept in the British Museum include coins, a gold ring, silver bars and a crystal ball from the fifth century encased in gold.
Experts estimate the value of the fund to be between the equivalent of 3.5 and 14 million euros.
jok / AFP