Likely Guy
Hero Member
2009-06-10 21:14
Bratislava - A Slovak homeowner unearthed a pot load of 300-year-old copper coins buried under his outhouse in what historians describe as an exceptional find, a museum official said on Wednesday.
The finder was digging a foundation for an extension of his house in the southwestern Slovak town of Surany when he came across a ceramic pot filled with some 1 700 copper coins.
They were minted for Francis II Rakoczi, a Hungarian aristocrat, who led an unsuccessful uprising against the Habsburg Empire in the early 1700s.
"The coins were used to pay for confiscated supplies and ceased to be worth anything as soon as the army was gone," Anton Stevko, the director of Nitra Museum, told the German Press Agency dpa.
The money was likely buried in the gardens belonging to a nearby manor when the Rakoczi forces were defeated, Stevko said.
"Their owner probably decided to hide them just in case Rakoczi would ever make it back to power," he said.
The manor land was turned into family house plots after World War II, Stevko said.
The outhouse had been thus sitting atop the treasure for decades - until the homeowner decided that the latrine had to give way to the annex.
Stevko estimated the current value of one coin at between three to seven euros but added that they still had to be evaluated by an expert.
- SAPA
At an average of 5 Euros each that's $7.00 US x 1700= $11,900
Bratislava - A Slovak homeowner unearthed a pot load of 300-year-old copper coins buried under his outhouse in what historians describe as an exceptional find, a museum official said on Wednesday.
The finder was digging a foundation for an extension of his house in the southwestern Slovak town of Surany when he came across a ceramic pot filled with some 1 700 copper coins.
They were minted for Francis II Rakoczi, a Hungarian aristocrat, who led an unsuccessful uprising against the Habsburg Empire in the early 1700s.
"The coins were used to pay for confiscated supplies and ceased to be worth anything as soon as the army was gone," Anton Stevko, the director of Nitra Museum, told the German Press Agency dpa.
The money was likely buried in the gardens belonging to a nearby manor when the Rakoczi forces were defeated, Stevko said.
"Their owner probably decided to hide them just in case Rakoczi would ever make it back to power," he said.
The manor land was turned into family house plots after World War II, Stevko said.
The outhouse had been thus sitting atop the treasure for decades - until the homeowner decided that the latrine had to give way to the annex.
Stevko estimated the current value of one coin at between three to seven euros but added that they still had to be evaluated by an expert.
- SAPA
At an average of 5 Euros each that's $7.00 US x 1700= $11,900
