An abundance of hammereds?

[Easylife]

Was detecting really just that good before I initially joined the hobby about 10 years ago? I've heard stories of hammereds being in such abundance that pocketfuls were often the norm and that they would often just give them away! Well, I can possibly believe that to be true on maybe certain sites, though most of the land that I detect is previously undetected so maybe I am just unlucky? So just what was the reality?

[Steve RC]

It depended on which part of the country you were in. Those in East Anglia always seemed to be doing well in the early days whilst my club then based in the Midlands struggled to find many and each one brought admiirng comments at club meetings.

When i moved away to East Yorkshire the club i joined had access to land next to small villages where you could detect a field next to a church which always seemed to have been a fair or a market site and produced many hammered. Now with today's knowledge the finds were just the general accumulation of centuries of activity in the field around the village plus the manuring process using household waste.

[Bors]

I think It depended upon where in the country you live. I can remember reading a detecting magazine in the late 70`s and this guy from down South was telling his story how he went on a field and every few feet he was finding hammerd`s and strap ends and God knows what else , and I thought ,"No way does that happen" and I wrote to the Magazine saying how I thought this guy was exaggerating not just a little but a lot , and they wrote back and suggested that the pictures he`d sent to accompany the story didn`t lie.
Now years later and now knowing now,how many many more finds are found down the Southern counties than up here in the Northern counties I think the guy was probably telling the truth . So I`d say Certain Area`s of the UK played a big part in the Finds which where found and still are found and you can buy the top of the range detectors all you like, but if there not there in the first place to be had you won`t find them.

[Oxgirl]

Not everywhere though. I have a permission where there are literally loads of bronze pennies and half pennies (all 1900-1940's). Literally every few steps. I guess finding fair sites with a similar situation going back to medieval times will produce the same situation of numerous coins. But was that common? I doubt it

[Pete E]

i also wonder in the FB/YouTube world, just how many of the finds are genuine?

I know that some of the sponsored channels are under pressure to produce good finds and generally rack up subscribers numbers in return for the items have have received...

Even at Club level I have heard rumours of finds "coming from else where" so that they can be "found" on Club digs ect....

[Littleboot]

I tend to think there is a shared mentality between anglers and detectorists and as such it is likely that a certain amount of exaggeration can accumulate in the telling of a story. A big fish become a gi-normous fish etc. However, there has to be a big (ish) fish to begin the tale.

I used to scrounge a few hammereds up in Staffs. I was in the North of the county and as such it was mainly pasture and picking could be slim. Over on club digs in the south west of the county and into Shropshire there was more arable and the numbers bucked up a bit. Still, I was often a tad (well more than a tad ) suspicious of some of the finds made on club digs. It became obvious that some people 'found' things on digs that they had really dug elsewhere. But that is a whole other story.

Since detecting in France it has been like going back to the early days in the UK, but with better machines. No-one has detected my land but me. And hammered coins have been quite abundant, That is, even when only counting the good ones. A lot of hammered silvers in the UK are not much more than scrap and very small. Certainly most are far from rare but fun to find nonetheless. Over here, after the middle of the 1500's, the smaller denominations were made of copper alloy while they were still silver in the UK. I have to say I can't remember the time I came back from a waft without at least one. Most times I find more than half a dozen copper hammies in a session.
I live in the back of beyond and I have been astounded at the variety and quality of finds within walking distance of my front door. That said, I often go out and find nothing worth keeping (the aforementioned coppers are usually toast). In retrospect though we forget the blank days and we see and show the accumulated finds and they can be impressive. We edit our experiences.

[Carling 2]

Well I've been doing this hobby well over 20 years now it ain't like it used to be most places have been or are being detected and when I 1st started I gave loads of hammereds away 1 field of mine for instance produced 65 hammereds with 300 coming under the coil in that area and dinari ( 30 odd) and the usual associated finds,, this was all off 1 farm and as i said I've been tectin over 20 years but now I find very little in comparison (20 hammereds so far this year but I have thousands of acres in permissions and only rarely do I bother getting more as quite frankly it's a waste of time,, sorry guys but I'm sure most would agree detecting as had its glory days don't matter who or where you are.

[TheFenTiger]

I was said once that it was common for the workers in the sugar beet factories to sell gold stators in the pubs that had been washed off the beet and that the mudlarkers on the Thames used to find bucket fulls of finds.

[Carling 2]

It's a know fact that most of the hoards in the UK were found during the victorian period what with the building of railways and canals etc even where I live the farm workers found so much roman coinage on a well know roman site they used to call it fairy money and would be used for anything from giving the kids to gambling chips ( maybe some roman coins we find are a latter victorian addition???) anyways point of the matter finds gets less over time and I honestly believe detecting is starting to see the sunset as it were something which I and a well known archaeologist and detectorist said 5 years ago and to be fair it's got worse since then, it will take time and yes people will continue to make the odd find but as said tectin as seen the best of days a while ago.

[Dave77]

We have found lots of coins but hammered coins are very rare where I detect. Also no Romans and the Vikings must have had strong pockets but I still get excited when I find a toasted penny.

[Kenleyboy]

Seems we are finding the last remaining remnants left over from the good old days . I know on my permission the people who were on a few years before me were finding plenty of Roman coins yet I have only had a couple in the last few years of being on there , hardly any Victorian coins but plenty of Georgian pennies , maybe its something I am doing wrong .
Bottle digging is no different , we are just finding the left overs from past plundering .