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Settlement found near world’s largest Celtic coin hoard site
The maritime archaeology magazine Wreckwatch reports that a geophysical survey at the find site of the Le Câtillon II hoard, the largest Iron Age coin hoard in the world, discovered on the Channel Island of Jersey in 2012, has found evidence of a previously unknown Celtic settlement from the 1st century B.C. This is key new information that might explain how an extraordinary 70,000 coins, 11 gold torcs and assorted jewelry made their way from northern France to what scholars believed was then a remote unpopulated island.
Almost all of the coins belonged to the Coriosolitae tribe from the River Rance area in northern Brittany. The profusion of coins from around 55 B.C. are believed to have been produced to pay the troops fighting against the invading Roman legions of Julius Caesar. For unclear reasons, they loaded all this treasure onto a ship, transported it to Jersey and buried it on a hill.
Jersey was something of a magnet for Celtic coins hoards in the Late Iron Age. At least eight of them have been found there, as opposed to exactly zero of them on the neighboring island of Guernsey. Instead, Guernsey has all the Iron Age warrior burials, ancient shipwrecks and the evidence of occupation. The reason for this split is unknown, but scholars hypothesized it was related to Jersey’s reefs making the approach so dangerous to navigate that it was avoided by vessels, thereby making it a good secluded spot to bury tens of thousands of coins.
The results of the geophysical survey suggest that Celtic peoples were more than just highly-motivated occasional visitors to Jersey.
In the geophysical survey, the team found linear anomalies spanning several tens of metres, parallel and perpendicular to each other, some with subdivisions that resemble late iron age rural Celtic settlements in northern France.
Dr Hervé Duval-Gatignol, Société Jersiaise’s archaeologist, said: “This could represent part of a rectilinear enclosure consistent with known forms of rural settlements of late iron age date in Armorica.”
Small magnetic anomalies suggest pits and postholes of buildings.
The deterrent effect of Jersey’s dangerous coast and comparative seclusion would be an advantage to navigators confident and well-equipped enough to surmount the obstacles.
Dr Sean Kingsley, Wreckwatch’s editor-in-chief and an archaeologist who has explored more than 350 shipwrecks in the last 30 years, said the Celts were innovative boatbuilders and sailors: “By the time Caesar attacked Brittany in 56BC, the Celts’ seaborne trade was a well-oiled machine. Practical knowledge about low and high water times, the locations of shoals, winds, weather and landing places had long been passed down from generation to generation.
“In light of the dangerous shoals in the approaches to Jersey, it is possible that the Câtillon II hoard was shipped on a hide-boat vessel resembling the gold model of a boat from Broighter in Northern Ireland. This first century BC seacraft was equipped with a sail, steering oar pivoted near the stern and, crucially, nine oars on each side, which would have been invaluable to overcome unfavourable wind and steer clear of reefs. Ships built with hide or leather waterproof coverings fastened to a framework of light timbers sound flimsy but could be strongly constructed, light and flexible, ideal to ride the crests of high waves in the unpredictable Atlantic seas or for landing in almost any cove.”
The site where the hoard was buried may have provided another incentive to the Coriosolitae. There was a megalithic tomb from the Stone Age on the hilltop. The Celts frequently viewed such places as sacred, even thousands of years removed from the Neolithic construction, and its religious significance made it all the more fitting a location to bury the tribe’s treasure as it would have conferred otherworldly protection on top of the natural topographical defenses of the island.
Wreckwatch, an online magazine that covers maritime archaeology, history and art, has dedicated all of its latest issue to the Le Câtillon II hoard, and it makes for 115 ad-free pages of absolutely riveting content. There are articles about previous hoard finds on Jersey, fantastic first-person accounts of the discovery from the finders of the hoard, including background on how their search was spurred by a 30-year-old shaggy dog story from a local about how she and her father found coins in a jar in the roots of a tree when she was a kid, the thorny legal issues of heritage finds on Jersey which is a Crown dependency, the complexity of removing of a corroded lump of 70,000 coins in a half-ton soil block, the even greater complexity of excavating and conserving it in a laboratory for five years, the history of the Coriosolitae, geophysical surveys of the Le Câtillon site and much more. Simply scroll down to the bottom of the homepage, fill in your name and email address to receive the magazine. They publish quarterly and never spam, so it’s totally worth subscribing even if you have any interest in maritime archaeology.
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