Essex hoard of 122 Anglo-Saxon pennies could fetch £180,000 at auction

The coins will be auctioned in London

Some of the Anglo-Saxon pennies found by two metal detectorists in Essex will be put up for auction with a guide price of £180,000.

It was thought the hoard of 144 coins, discovered near Braintree, were buried in 1066, the year of the Battle of Hastings.

Noonans Mayfair in London will auction 122 pennies on Wednesday 21 February.

Its spokesman said its owner could have died in battle.

"Twelve shillings was a considerable sum of money, and its retrieval must have been prevented by some great personal misfortune, Bradley Hopper of Noonans Mayfair said.

"We cannot say with any certainty whether or not the Braintree hoard's owner died fighting at Hastings, but it is a tantalising possibility."

The people who found them would split the money with the landowner

Mr Hopper said an "extremely rare" Harold II penny from the Guildford moneyer Leofwold was part of the collection and had an estimated worth of up too £6,000.

"We are particularly fortunate that the auction catalogue contains not only the rarest and most academically interesting English coins from the Braintree Hoard, but also those pieces in the finest state of preservation,"he said.

The hoard was discovered in 2019, and 16 of them were bought by Colchester Museum and Cambridge's Fitzwilliam Museum, including two 11th century Byzantine coins.

The money raised from the auction will be split between the two finders and the landowner.

Before finding the pennies, the two detectorists had been searching for 20 years and had only found copper coins and crotal bells previously on the field.