The largest treasure of ancient Roman silver coins weighing 3.1 kg was found in Germany

In Germany, an amateur archaeologist discovered the country's largest treasure of ancient Roman silver coins, which had lain in the ground for almost two thousand years. Associated Press reports.

Oliver Riedl came across some silver denarii in a field near Wesseling, south of Cologne, a year ago. Realizing that the metal detector continued to send signals even after the first finds, the man called specialists. A team of experts arrived and immediately began excavations and recovered a total of 934 silver coins. The treasure, weighing a total of 3.1 kilograms, was exhibited at the LVR-LandesMuseum Bonn on Tuesday, September 22.

According to the department, the coins were likely deliberately buried in the second quarter of the 2nd century AD, during the reign of the Roman emperor Hadrian. This is the largest treasure from the time of Hadrian found in Germany. “Of course, we can only guess about the motives, but it is likely that someone wanted to keep this money safe. After all, banks did not exist then,” said state archaeologist Erich Klassen.

Researcher Rachel Otte provided a guideline for assessing the wealth of the owner of the treasure: in the time of Hadrian, an ordinary legionnaire received 300 denarii a year, but about half of this amount was kept for food and equipment. Thus, to collect the treasure from Wesseling, a soldier would have to save all his available funds for about six years.

The Cologne area was under Roman control from about 39 BC to 459 AD, and a military camp founded there by order of the general Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa later became the city of Colonia Agrippina - modern Cologne.