EBay, Lueke and the Coin Elves (Part 1)

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It seems the coineys have it in for Professor Nathan Elkins, an academic numismatist who sides with the Preservationist White Hat guys rather than with the no-questions-asked antiquities buyers and sellers. First to start the mud-slinging was bitter Old Man Sayles, copied by Jorg Lueke on his "A Historical Perspective" ("exploring history and how it is crafted, manipulated, and used by governments, agencies, and others") blog. When however challenged to formulate and back up his views more precisely, he now claims that what he wrote was "satire". Lueke now follows up his ("satirische") Schlammschlachten, ja, ja with an exposition ("Archaeologist finds all the "evidence" he needs on Ebay") about why what we can see on eBay in fact does not show what it seems to show. Once again this is focussed on the person of "Dr. Nathan T Elkins an Assistant Professor of Art History at Baylor":

In a recent appearance focusing on the cultural property of Bulgaria Dr. Elkins displays a fondness for using Ebay as a source for his arguments. This comes as no surprise as Dr. Elkins used Ebay as a research tool when he wrote his article “Why Coins Matter”. This fondness for superficial results from Ebay opens up several interesting questions that I shall examine.

Having said that of course, the coiney does not. Now, Nathan Elkins has been looking into the US trade on ancient coins for a number of years, and from what I know of that research (which I venture to suggest is considerably more than what Jorg Lueke knows about his research) I would not say that his conclusions are based on "superficial results from Ebay". That is the first straw man argument offered by coiney Lueke.

Coiney Lueke indicates that in his opinion on the extremely rare occasions a seller of dugup ancient coins gives the information from which country they came, it would be "a rather naïve belief [...] that eBay sellers are in all cases telling the truth and not simply marketing what they think will work". In other words' Lueke has no problem accepting that collectors of ancient coins in the US and elsewhere are being lied to by the dealers selling them. Given an awareness of that level of deceit, in what way could that person then turn round and say this is a "legitimate market"? Why would somebody lie about coins coming "from Bulgaria", instead of admitting they come from which country?

Mr Lueke suggests that the number of coins actually being sold by eBay is less than the number presented by Nathan Elkins (nota bene NOT in his comments on the Bulgaria MOU but in several articles on the more general issues connected with the US trade in dugup coins). Lueke suggests we should note how many coins are SOLD rather than the number offered from sale. Presumably he considers that the ones not sold any given week are the ones that fell off trees or were produced by the coin elves and did not come out of the ground, so they are irrelevant to the question about the damage caused by the no-questions-asked market masking looting. But it is not just eBay is it? Let us then note that in parallel venues are also relatively high numbers of coins offered for sale. Just one example is the ACCG's old fried: V-coins (today: "160 Ancient Dealers, 98,940 Items, $22,743,591" - all produced by the coin Elves no doubt).

As it happens, today there are 26,725 results to be found in the category "Coins ancient" on eBay.com. If we narrow that down to those located only in the US, the result is "16,359 results" - so today 61% of the global trade in such items is being done out of the USA (a country whose soil does not as a rule produce ancient coins). Lueke himself notes that when he looks for coins produced in the Roman mint Serdica (mainly supplied the Balkan region and limes, but these coins also reached Britannia) "most of those are already in the US".

The figures for eBay sales of such items today are far higher than the number "5000 a week" mentioned by Elkins and now criticised by Lueke. Yes, it is true that not all those coins are sold from week to week, while some with "buy it now" prices will have gone well before we open the page to look. The feedback for many sellers shows the number of items week after week, month after month. This is (part of ) the turnover of the market, obviously many more items need to be added to the market every week and month to produce the stock from which clients with different needs and financial abilities select what they fancy. Many US dealers have stock which extends far beyond what they put on sale on the Internet any given day, week or month.

What one can see happening on the Internet is not just an array of (superficial) "figures" used to "support" any arguments. This is information anyone can see for themselves when they open the eBay page (or any other dealer's list, or "uncleaned bulk lots of coins" sales sites and discussion lists, of which there are many). However you spin those numbers, they do not reflect too well on the trade when you see how many of them are offered with any sort of information where they came from or any sort of expressly-worded guarantee offered by the seller that he only offers coins where there is due diligence done to ascertain that these are not freshly surfaced coins from recent looting and smuggling, but material he can demonstrate to the buyer has a documented history of licit acquisition and legal export (and legal import into the US).

Looking at the sorry array of sales offers giving no such guarantees (let alone offering potential customers any information about the documentation of legal collecting history and export) and comparing that with what (in the situation this market finds itself in) a truly legitimate market in such material should look like in the second decade of the twenty-first century can readily lead the onlooker to certain conclusions.

Lueke says:

In my view there is no rationale for believing the figures hastily printed off of (sic) eBay and woven (sic) around in front of some bureaucratic committee [i.e., CPAC PMB]. Even if true the story this volume of coins would (sic) tell about a marketplace, one that doesn’t exist in reality, would be contradictory at best [...] all these numbers are make believe and created just to serve a pre-defined purpose: to make it harder to collect coins [...] these numbers are hogwash and I will shortly present a more rational analysis of the current market.

It is unclear why Lueke says there is no "marketplace" for ancient coins when he himself makes use of it to add to his own collection. Anyway, we await with bated breath his promised analysis of the figures to show that the Coin Elves do not really put all that many undocumented ancient coins on the US market.

EBay Fails to Enforce its Own Policies on Antiquities

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SAFECorner has a text on eBay "EBay: Lip service is not enough!".

As the holiday shopping season goes into full force, eBay - the leading online auction and shopping site – once again offers a dizzying array of objects listed under “antiquities.” Described as “early Neolithic,” “Bronze age”, “Tang Dynasty,” to “Khmer,” “Pre-Columbian,” “12th Century Djenne,” “Ancient Roman,” etc. these “antiquities” are advertised to originate from all corners of the world. They include coins, pottery, shards, pieces of "ancient" monuments, statues, textiles, jewelry of all kinds, so on and so forth. The prices offered would suit any budget, ranging from a mere penny to millions of dollars, usually with shipping thrown in for free!

SAFE points out that in theory eBay (based in UNESCO 1970 Convention member state USA) has some rather strict guidelines about the offering for sale of imported antiquities on its website. According the section on "restricted items: artifacts":

Make sure your listing follows these guidelines. If it doesn't, it may be removed, and you may be subject to a range of other actions, including restrictions of your buying and selling privileges and suspension of your account
[...]

Listings for antiquities have to meet the following criteria:

- Items have to be authentic.
- Sellers have to include either a photo or a scanned image of an official document that clearly shows both the item's country of origin and the legal details of the sale (it has to be approved for import or export)

Of course V-coins and other such-like sales venues have no such stipulation on export licensces and other documentation of origins, just as well really as to judge from the lack of any mention of them by most sellers, one would be justified in getting the impression that many artefacts on the US market are sold without them - or at least nobody over there cares about them. The bit about "authenticity" is a laugh, too. As SAFE asks: "Are these guidelines are being followed? We invite our readers to take a few minutes to peruse the eBay site and see for themselves". Has anything changed in this over the past decade or so? Are the stringent guidelines put in place with such fanfare in German y and Switzerland a couple of years back being adhered to? Have a look.

As SAFE says: "It is high time for eBay (and its many counterparts) to put action behind its own policies and guidelines. Posting them on the web site alone simply does not suffice".

One Like it on the PAS website

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Like metal detectorist 'Flying2Blue' discussed here before, EBay seller 4t9a (1048) ("fortyniner"? address "England United Kingdom") has for a number of years been a firm believer in private sales for antiquities. He's selling things like for example this:

230662801178: Stunning Medieval Knife Handle Terminal ~ see PAS,

"Medieval English, Believed to represent 'PUCK' the mischievous Sprite of Medieval folklore. These terminals turn up occasionally and are very collectable. There is a picture of one on the Portable Antiquities Scheme website. Length 20mm starting at $45.57

He forgot to give the PAS numbers of the reported find and its supposed parallel. Now this is quite an interesting use of the database of artefacts hoiked from Britain's archaeological sites mainly by artefact hunters, to use to sell other artefacts hoiked from Britain's archaeological sites by artefact hunters.

But this does not often pay off. There's this "PILGRIM BADGE ~ Believed to be Knights Crusader related" 230661993295

Knight's Pilgrim Badge Cross Fleury with 6 Petalled Rose Solid bronze (i.e. not repousse) Beautiful Pilgrim Badge ~ primitive construction yet very detailed. One fleury end slightly awry but the badge is complete. The 6 petalled Rose is rarely seen and is usually associated with Mary Magdalene. More likely worn by Crusader than ordinary Pilgrim in my opinion. Would have been attached to clothing with four stitches. Measures 31mm Not seen this type before and can't find no reference to it.

Only five quid, and all those BIG WORDS, my my the guy must know what he's talking about, eh? Somehow the mount reminds me of something else... I think this seller is looking in the wrong part of the PAS database. Thoughtlessly, the PAS don't have a keyword "Knights Crusader", which rather hinders this member of the public finding what he wants on this resource (mainly used it seems from the annual reports by metal detectorists "seeking parallels to their finds". I bet it is, easier than books isn't it?). How can they advertise things for sale on eBay if they can't find out what it is? That's probably why instead of going to the PAS they were going along to forums like UKDN.

Then there's 230662804944 VIKING RARITY ~ British Find ~ HOWLING BEAST Bowl Mount

Fascinating artefact. Made from Bronze. All four limbs intact. The beast has some scales on its back. Detailed hands. Open mouth in howling pose. Slight incurve to rear suggesting this mount was from a bowl. Evidence of iron near shoulders and possibly had iron tail for affixing to bowl. Note: this is not a pendant with a broken loop, the jaws are moulded. VIKING ART IS VERY STYLISED ~ THERE IS NO DEFINITE HEAD AS SUCH, JUST THE JAWS [...] STYLE IS FROM THE 'BORRE STYLE' PERIOD (900AD APPROX) THE 'KANGAROO' TYPE REAR LEGS AND THE 'CUFFED WRISTS' IS SEEN IN VIKING ART FROM THIS PERIOD. Quite big. Dimensions 46mm x 36mm Extremely rare artefact A very low starting price here"

only 75 quid, no possibility then that it's anything else? I mean its not really CLASSIC "Borre Style" is it? Sort of 'crude-commercial-spin-by-ignorant-metal-detected-finds-seller-trying-to-con-you-probable-Late-Medieval-harness-mount-fragment-is-viking' type Borre, isn't it? Again the seller got the wrong part of the PAS database. [Actually it looks more like Kermit the frog with a hangover.] Perhaps PAS might decide that to help their "partners" get the most out of their ("only interested in it for the history- honest") hobby, they could provide guidelines on "How to use the PAS database to get better prices for your finds on eBay"?

And here's a rarity, an object with a "provenance":
EDWARD the ELDER ~ Extremely Rare Anglo-Saxon Penny 230662191742 starting at 275 quid:

EDWARD the ELDER 'Hand of Providence' Penny minted in Anglo-Saxon England between 899 - 924 AD Edward the Elder was the son of Alfred the Great. He ruled over Anglo-Saxon England with the help of his sister Aethelflaed (The Lady of the Mercians). The coin has been folded over possibly from Anglo-Saxon times as the condition on the inside looks good what I can see of it. The Hand of Providence can be seen as well as some random letters (different letters from the coin in Spinks 1081) these I believe make up the moneyers name. Small amount of damage to the outer face but generally a very legible coin. Small crack as indicated by white line in one of the photos, done some time in antiquity (I have not tried to open the fold although sorely tempted!). Very low starting price

As for provenance: This coin has been purchased from a collector. It has been part of his collection since 1998. He in turn received the coin from the original finder. Details of informative correspondence from the collector about the coin will be included which includes the interesting find location. The original Find location will be given to winning bidder only.

Don't bother mate. We know the provenance. Its a Trevor Ashmore copy. It is a shame the "finder" did not show it to the PAS, it would have saved everybody a lot of hassle and accusations that 4t9a is selling a FAKE. I believe that several collectors have already written to him informing him of it, but the object still has not had its description altered or been removed from sale. In fact what was this "finder" playing at? You'd have to be pretty heavy-handed to get a freshly minted coin that's never been in the ground to crack like that when bent once. What did he do, drive his car over it a couple of times to give it that battered look? I bet the correspondence with the collector is a cracking good laugh.

Never mind, if he comes across this, the coin's buyer can ask me and I'll give him the name of a metal detectorist in the UK who can get it unbent, an abusive, illiterate and unpleasant little twerp, but good with his hands. So at least he'll have a flat Trevor Ashmore copy.

4t9a says "OVERSEAS BUYERS MOST WELCOME BUT PAYMENT BY PAYPAL ONLY PLEASE" (he forgot to say they'd have to wait for the export licence)

But that's what you get when you buy antiquities irresponsibly put onto the UK dugup antiquities market (ie items unreported to the PAS). You are in the hands of sellers with unfettered imaginations about what the find is who know jolly well that the people buying this stuff are as ignorant, many of them, as planks. You are in the hands of sellers who'll swear blind that they "honestly did not know" that what they are selling is not authentic (and refuse to believe it when they are told). Anyone can sell old things and present themselves as an expert by throwing in a few big words they saw on the back of a cornflake packet. Seller 4t9a has sold over a thousand artefacts in the past couple of years. Sadly since his or her sales are hidden we cannot see if they were all as poorly described as these four. The entire antiquities market is a swamp, some bits of it are less smelly and quagmirish than others, but generally its not a good place to venture.

So what is the point of collecting "pieces of history" if they are the wrong bits of history and you are too ignorant to tell the difference?

UPDATE 22.08.11
Over on the EnglishHammered (coins) forum there has been some discussion of the coin all day, several members have been stubbornly giving this seller the benefit of doubt, offering to send him pictures of known Ashmore fakes so he can modify the listing... well, look for yourselves what his reaction was reported to be and their conclusion. The long and short of it the coin has been reported to eBay as a fake this evening. Let's see if they react (they do not always) Note the added question and answer added, after the seller had already been informed that its a copy:

Q:	Hi, Is this the original coin or an Ashmore copy? Thank you	Aug-22-11
A:	Thank you for your question. I believe it is an original, I bought it as such and was given the Metal detector find location by the collector/dealer. If it is a copy then it is the best I have ever seen, I would think it impossible to age silver like this coin. If you think it is copy then best not to bid as I am not offering a refund on this coin due to its folded condition. Best Regards, Pete

Of course the copy is not all that good, the cut of the lettering is all wrong. The coin is not particularly "aged" either, except by somebody mistreating it in some way. But it's got a "metal detector find location" hasn't it? Of course anybody can say they "found" any object anywhere can't they? Here (because the object is in fact modern), we have a clear example of a false "metal detector findspot", how many that get into the PAS database have similarly false findspots?

Spokesperson: "No place for illegal activity" on Internet Auction Site

Martin Wainwright: eBay seller faces £50,000 fine for auction fixing
Trader Paul Barrett bid for his own items – from cars to pie warmers - on eBay to increase prices:

Vanessa Canzini, head of corporate communications for eBay in Europe, said: "We are extremely pleased to learn of the conviction of Paul Barrett. Shill bidding is illegal and it is important for people to understand that there is not, nor has there ever been, room for illegal activity on our site.

But we note that since it started up, they feel that making lots of money from people selling antiquities which have no pedigree legalising them is quite acceptable business practice, even though the places where they come from forbid their sale by law.

Seen on eBay

I mentioned in the post below that I am writing an article on metal detecting in Eastern Europe. It is only supposed to be ten pages so I am cutting stuff out. This bit took a bit of effort to put together and is going, so I thought I would post it here.

"Quite clearly Roman sites are being targeted by the artefact hunters supplying this market. The antiquities section of the US-based eBay was typical. Of the 7121 antiquities assigned to European cultures on 1st April 2010, Some 4700 of the items (66% of the total) were listed as “Roman”, 776 (11 %), were listed as “Greek”, and 1280 (18%) as medieval. This pattern may be compared with that of the ancient coins being offered by US sellers on eBay in a separate section. On the same day there were 9284 Roman coin lots (69% of the total of ancient coins of non-Asian origin), 2802 (15%) ancient Greek ones, and 901 (6%) medieval coin offers and 290 Celtic coins. Many of the Roman category were “bulk lots” of lower grade Roman coins (sometimes mixed with other artefacts) which have every appearance of being the products of the selection of the better finds from the large-scale stripping of metal objects from Roman sites. The figures for the UK's eBay were similar, of 6007 European antiquities offered by sellers based in the UK, there were 2644 (44%) Roman finds, 1175 (20%)Medieval (plus Viking and Anglo-Saxon) finds , but 293 (4%) Greek ones. On the UK Ebay the proportions were not quite similar: 2053 Roman coin lots ( 46%) and 261 Greek ones (5%) and 1930 medieval coins (43%), 219 Celtic".

There are some striking differences between the two markets and some striking differences between either and what we would see if an archaeologist was metal detecting an average Roman villa or settlement site, the proportions would look somewhat different, with many more metal artefacts being collected. Obviously much of this material is falling by the wayside on its way from the archaeological assemblage to the collectors' market. But just look at the US figures. Totally disproportionate. The US market quite clearly is not absorbing a representative range of metal detected finds from Europe. Look for example at the disparity of Medieval and Greek artefacts between the two markets. What mechanisms lie behind this pattern, and where are the other finds going?

Anglo-Saxon Pendant on Sale- Treasure?

eBay item 160364228589 Top-rated seller asgard-arts (2483) Buckinghamshire, United Kingdom (posts to "Worldwide")

STUNNING SAXON GOLD & GARNET PENDANT
This is an absolutely Stunning Solid Gold Circular Pendant, decorated with spiralled filigry and spheres, the centre set with a garnet stone. Totally intact with hanging loop making this a perfect wearable piece. Dating to the Saxon Period 650 to 700 A.D.
Measuring 2.4cm in height.
Ref only; asgard-arts.com Valuation; Benet's Guide from £3200
Unconditionally Guaranteed to be Genuine and Ancient
100% GOLD POWERSELLER

What it of course does not say is where and when it was found and whether it has been disclaimed as Treasure as the law requires. I thought eBay was watching things like this.

Asgard says: OVER 40 YRS EXPERIENCE IN FINE ARTS WITH 100% GUARANTEED ORIGINAL PAINTINGS.WE SELL RARE ROMAN, SAXON AND CELTIC ANTIQUITIES ALSO QUALITY SWORDS,SUITS OF ARMOUR AT BARGAIN PRICES.

They also have a "BEAUTIFUL RARE CELTIC BRONZE HORSE AND RIDER STATUE" (becoming quite popular aren't they?) "The Warrior figure has stylised features of Danubian Celts". Looks more like a robot to me.

No Honour Among Thieves

As we know, metal detector users tend in general not to be particularly skilled lingustically, whether in the written or spoken word. The reader then may not be particularly surprised by this particular egregious example from eBay found by the Rev Paul Bulgerin being offered by a seller from Wayne, PA, USA:

GREEK OR ROMAN SILVER COIN, FIND IT WITH METAL DETACTORE, FROM OVER SEE, THE SIZE OF IT THE SIZE OF HALF DOLLAR, I DIDN'T CLEEN IT THEY TOLD ME BATTER NOT TO DO, I JUST TEST THE SIDE TO NOW IT'S SILVER YOU CAN CALEEN IT IF YOU WANT TO SHOW ALL THE SILVER IN IT, I AM NOW OVER SEE SO I WILL SHIP IT WITH IXPRESS MAIL, I WILL SEND IT ANY WHERE IN THE WORLD, YOU WILL GET IT WITH SIGNATURE, 100% SILVER, I DO HAVE OTHER COIN YOU CAN SEE MY LEST, I DO PUT THE ADD EVERY TIME I FIND ONE NEW. YOU CAN C THE FIRST PIC LOOK LIKE IT'S SMALLER THAN THE 2ND BUY IT'S THE SAME COINE JUST WITH THE SCAN ONE LOOK BIGER THAN THE OTHER, IT'S THE SAME COIN FROM THE FRONT AND THE BACK.

The coin is pictured below, it sold for 47$. There is another auction ongoing at the moment from the same seller. This is described as a "roman or greek" bronze coin:

I SOLD ONE THE SAME, I HAD 2 OF THESE. THIS IS ROMAN OR GREEK COIN, I GOT FROM THE GROUND OVER SEE WITH MY METAL DETACTOR, THE SIZE OF THE QUARTER, I TRYED TO GET GOOD PIC OF IT THROW THE SCANER, I DIDN'T CLEEN THE COIN, I AM OVER SEE NOW SO I WILL SHIP IT INTERNATIONAL MAIL WITH SIGNATURE, AND SEND THE TRACK #

The same studiously laboured language. Yet the seller's feedback shows he does not have these problems with formulating a sentence in English when he is selling gold bullion, cosmetics, mp3 player or a mobile phone. The coins offered are fakes, the first is a copy of a bronze sestertius of Maximinus I, probably Bulgarian in origin, the second is a tourist souvenir fake of a Ptolemaic coin. If one looks back at the seller's feedback he has sold a number of such items as from the "Middle East". It seems from the way the seller moves to a different written style to convince people that they are what he asserts, suggests he is well aware that these are not what he says they are. When was he going "overseas" to do this metal detecting, and has he got an export licence for the proceeeds? Apart from the fact that the current no-questions-asked market allows anyone to pass themselves off as a finder and legitimate owner of an ancient object, which could in fact have come from anywhere, and which allows abuses like this. What is particularly interesting here is the social perception of the metal detectorist in Pennsylvania. Both seller and buyer expect a metal detector using artefact hunter to be semi-literate and write as though he has a total of nine months in school to his name. Even fake coin sellers are poking fun at the tekkies' spelling.

Felix Salmon on the "antiquities-on e-bay debate"

Felix Salmon's blog on the Charles Stanish story on e-Bay fakes which is still going the rounds is not remarkable in itself. The comment by Charles Stanish however is. Well worth a read.

The blog was occasioned by a somewhat aggressive post made elsewhere ("Cheaper by the Millions") by an arrowhead collector, one Bill Stelzer from Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He said that Charles Stanish was wrong because he's bought lots of arrowheads on eBay and they are "all genuine" (he even sent the journalist one smuggled out of some Saharan country to "prove" it). He says: "There are no fake Neolithic arrowheads. Nobody even wants the real ones". I say he's deluding himself. he is also misleading everyone when he writes:

The eBay sites that auction antiquities are among the most vetted sites on the Internet. [...] EBay demands that the detailed description accompanying each item explicitly state that the piece is authentic, or it is not [...] If the collectors and dealers monitoring the sites suspect a fake, they can and do contact eBay. If there is agreement on the issue, the seller is required to revise the description and remove the word "authentic" and the fraudulent date or withdraw the piece from the sale.

Nonsense. Collectors' forums are full of posts complaining that until Stanish's article drew attention to this problem, eBay was exceptionally unwilling to cancel auctions that they were being informed by concerned individuals were of fakes.

eBay deal concerning Scotland's archaeological heritage

The internet auction site eBay has agreed to stop selling unreported ancient artefacts from Scotland (Brian Donnolly eBay deal protects country’s ancient treasures, the Herald August 16th 2009). This follows a number of cases of the illegal sale of artefacts through the portal in the past. These objects are all protected by Scotland's Treasure Trove legislation (rather than the 1996 Treasure Act which applies in most other parts of the UK) and belong to the state (Crown). It is only when treasure trove assessors at museums reject artefacts that finders can become keepers who may then do as they wish with the items they have found, if the Crown retains the object the finder gets an award equal to the full market value. Nevertheless, a large number of finders are believed to not be reporting finds to the Treasure Trove Unit as the law requires.

Now, if only eBay would institute a similar ban on metal detected items from England and Wales which are not accompanied by a PAS number, and antiquities from any foreign country which has export restrictions without the seller saying explicitly that he can supply the buyer with a copy of the export licence or other documentation to show it left the surce country legitimately. Then we could all sleep a little sounder.

Well Organised "Mafia" Business

The attempt to clear internet sales portal eBay of as many sellers of forged archaeological finds goes on. There is (as collectors well know) a large centre involved in the production of fake antiquities in Bulgaria. Some of the sellers of such items however are proving difficult to get rid of. As soon as one account is deleted, dormant accounts are reactivated. Some of these sellers operate from bases in the UK, where the products are lost among the numbers of material coming (their sellers claim) from legal artefact hunting on local archaeological and other ‘productive’ sites.

Christian Rizzo (near Villefranche sur Mer on the French Riviera, eBay seller "shams06") writes:

The problem with the bulgarian dealers it's that they seem are working all together (or alone with several pseudo[nym]s ) with the same fake makers ( we can find some of these fake makers on the web looking for "art foundry" in Bulgaria where they show their models ). It's why we use to see at the same time from different sellers exactly the same items. And they use the same agents for collecting the money and sending the sold items. It's why you cannot have a direct contact with the seller and why a lot of sold items never arrive to the buyer ( see the feedback of Annaatana37 for example) or when they arrive they need more than 1 month shipping because the do grouped shipping. Unregistered you can find them some time later with an other pseudo[nym], in another country but with the same items. It's a very well organised " mafia " business.

The significance of the evidence is clear to dealers and collectors - as it should be to eBay who've been happy to take money from these people for providing a sales place for their activities all these years. All know that their no-questions-asked approach favours the use of the antiquities market as a source of funding for organized crime through fraud, the selling of forgeries. Yet they still refuse to even contemplate doing anything about it. I presume they treat it as “somebody else’s problem”, nothing to do with them. Like looting of archaeological sites.

"Fake" says Stanish and sellers vanish

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Professor of Anthropology, the Director of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA Charles Stanish, first wrote about how eBay has altered the transporting and selling of illegal artifacts in the last part of the 2008 issue of the newsletter Backdirt: Annual Review, Why I love eBay pp 82-5. In April 2009, the UCLA Newsroom ran a story based on the latter. The article was then rerun by the May/June 2009 issue of Archaeology magazine. Since then, the story has become very widely reported, it has been picked up by numerous media outlets, including the Nature blog, and Scientific American. A Google search found many dozens of examples of different online versions of this story. I covered it here. I also posted a link to the AncientArtifacts Forum. Oddly enough – since fighting fake items, especially sold through the world’s best known internet sales portal is one of the leitmotifs of the group’s activity - nobody wanted to discuss it. Silence.

This problem has been around since the beginning of eBay, the number of fake ancient (and not only) coins for example on sale there is staggering. Ebay has been going through the motions of providing customer protection, but one gets the impression that they have been more interested in hanging on to the revenue-producing sellers than looking after the customers who buy things there. Many of the people buying portable antiquities clearly have not the foggiest what they are looking at. People in the know who contacted bidders and told them they were People reporting sellers to Ebay for selling fakes were ignored. bidding on fakes were routinely warned by eBay and suspended. Now, in a bout of paranoid absurdity, even the bidders’ pseudonyms is hidden to prevent this happening. Among hard-core collectors of portable antiquities, eBay (they call it contemptuously "fleabay") has very little credibility.

Since Professor Stanish’s story became big news, there have however been further quite unexpected developments. Ebay has actually been booting the most notorious fake sellers off their portal. One of the first to go was a dealer with shops in Byblos and Dubai selling a load of the most excrable stone (?) sort-of-classical sculptures all of them given “provenances” as having been dug up in the Syria-Lebanon area. They have now announced that they are withdrawing from eBay, in other words, in eBay slang, they have been NARUed.Another one to go is the eBay seller “The-Oddest-Thing”, discussed here a couple of times.

What seems to have happened (see the archives of the Yahoo AncientArtifacts discussion list was an antiquities dealer from Erie Colorado managed to get hold of the email addresses to two top executives in eBay (John Donahoe - President/CEO and Lorrie Norrington, Head of North America) and alerted them to the problem. The executives seem to have instructed their staff to take these problems seriously (presumably the Stanish articles were generating bad publicity) and several people have been reporting fake antiquity sellers from the group’s black list. Within a few days, 26 had gone of a list of 251 individuals sent to eBay. A week later, the accounts of the following sellers are reported to have been suspended or closed:

919nba1981, activ555, ancientantiques, ancientmix, annaatana37, Byblosantiques, camilia.123, Egyptian.deals , egyptianbrilliant, egyptiancivilization, egyptianhistory, egyptianseller, egyptiantrust, egyptianworld, exceedbay, friendship_curio, g..f..w, green_id_monster, kiroseez, lazaropolett, lost_civ, loveuegypt, perfect.antiques, pharaonichistory, pharaooooh*2007, tianboyiyuan, vergina**, w-daboor, and fakes removed from the listings of: solmon123 and knights*castle (Roman*1).

The whistleblower now reports:

My latest attack is trying to get the mysterious "prohibited items group" to establish a carte blanche policy of not allowing anyone in Egypt, China, Peru, Lebanon, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Syria, Mexico, from even offering anything "ancient" on eBay. If authentic, it's against most laws of cultural patrimony, and if fake, it's fraud. By definition, eBay should not allow either. Hopefully we will hear back on this front soon.

The dealer does not seem to accept that items from these countries are legal if accompanied by an export licence or other such paperwork. The new policies established on eBay.de as well as Austria and Switzerland take this into account. It should not be too difficult to apply this to sellers in the US too. Could it be that the US dealer is simply interested in cutting down the competition? Let us see eBay establishing a rule that only items which can be documented as being sold in accordance with ALL "cultural patrimony" laws should be sold through their portal.

Meanwhile, if this continues, eBay seems headed towards going from (according to Charles Stanish) a phenomenon undermining the antiquities trade through diluting it with fakes, to one fuelled by looted artefacts, though I wonder if their top executives are at all worried about that? Maybe we should start emailing them too.

Wenneb... shabtis still on Sale, in New York this time

In February we were examining the sale of "Wenneb..." shabtis as a result of which several ethical British dealers withdrew them from sale because it looked likely that they were from a recently looted tomb. No new evidence has emerged to show that these were legitimately excavated and legally exported items, nor any securely provenanced to old collections, so it is therefore disappointing to see they are still on sale. In addition to the UK artefact hunter (still) offering one, we find Windsor Antiquities from New York offering one on eBay. Where did it come from? The seller says nothing.

Ancient Egyptian Faience Ushabti w/Hierogliph C.26th Dynasty 600 BC great details Size 2 1/2 inches high (6.3 cm long) Ancient Egyptian Faience Ushabti conditon perfect .Guaranteed Authenticity. coa available for a charge of $5 each.Shipping and handling $5.00 US and Canada $10.00 International. Combined shipping accepted for multiple lots. Windsor Antiques 1050 Second Avenue Gallery 16, New York, NY 10022 Tel 212-3191077

Instead of a "certificate of authenticity" for an additiona five bucks on top of the thirty or so which is how six eBay biddeers currently price this object, I am sure the ethical collector who knows what is what would far more appreciate copies of the documentation that the object has a verifiably legitimate provenance without which (and given the circumstances) that "authenticity" seems pretty damning. Anyway, any seller who says ths item has "great details" is patently stretching the truth suspiciously in at least that aspect of his description.

Where is Dr Hawass and his merry antiquity board men? Why has he not got a hotline set up so market-watchers can report suspicious things like this to his enormous staff so they can investigate? If this object is one of a group freshly looted and illegally transported out of Egypt as some UK dealers apparently suspect, then surely getting hold of those responsible is far more important in protectng the archaeological heritage than quarrelling about the partage of the 1912 Armarna finds or the other repatriation media storms the Egyptians are currently involved in.

"Job Lot of Ten PAS-Identified Objects"

“Buy it Now” price eight quid for:

200336679876 Lot of 10 artefacts from various periods all identified with PAS information slips. Postage and packaging is £2.00 inland UK and £4.00 USA and worldwide.

They seem mostly to be buckle elements. The seller Antiquebottledigger based in Nottingham UK has been on eBay since June 1998, now registered as a ‘business seller’ and has 2572 transaction points. He has been mentioned here before as the vendor of one of the group of shabtis I was querying here earlier – still no buyers.

The seller currently has on offer 503 auctions of metal artifacts (77 of which are coins, and a number of which are multiple objects offered as a single lot), probably the overwhelming majority of which are metal detector finds. But they are not his own, some are labelled as being from Lincolnshire, others from the Thames foreshore. To this the seller has added other items bought somewhere on the market, as evidenced not by the shabti, but also a Dark Age belt fitting are of southern central European type.

While it is nice to see that some of the items dug up in the UK have been recorded by the PAS before they were sold on, it is notable that this only applies to ten objects sold as a single lot out of the five hundred. While some of the items offered are old-timey pieces of no great age or archaeological significance, so not particularly PAS record-worthy, scattered among them are a sizable number of items which certainly are. The ten items out of more than 500 lots means that this dealer is showing that only a fifth of a percent of the metal detected finds on offer have been reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme. This is pretty typical of what we see on eBay in general. All the rest of the items on sale by this seller have been removed from the ground without any kind of record (as we have seen in this blog, in the case of the Balkan and Egyptian finds also probably found their way onto eBay by illicit channels). Still, I am sure if a foreign buyer purchases one of these items Mr Antiquebottledigger will be sending any items which are the direct products of excavation abroad with the export licence sorted out, apparently (since he makes no mention of one) for no extra charge.

Several factors lead us to the conclusion that the items being reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme are only a relatively small proportion of those being removed day by day, week by week, month by month and year by year from archaeological assemblages all over Britain. The most British archaeologists and policy makers can do is shrug their shoulders.

Lots of fresh ancient coins on sale today via the internet

Given the unseemly fuss I mentioned here which was being kicked up last week by some US dealers about just two lots of “English dugups” being discussed by Frankfurt University numismatist Nathan Elkins, I thought I would take a look to see how typical of the material being offered for sale this morning they actually are.

On Monday morning at 7.00 am CET on eBay there were 6875 items being offered in the “Ancient coins” section of eBay(US) of which 721 finish in the next 24 hours. Some of these coins are fakes, many are single offers of selected cleaned coins. Others however are similar to those being sold by the three dealers discussed in these pages and by Nathan Elkins earlier. These are multiple lots of coins of less select condition, many are roughly cleaned or still have layers of earth on them. Most of these seem likely to be the remains of bulk shipments to the seller from which more presentable coins have been selected for individual sale. Most of them are described as “lots”, which is the search term I used. The eBay search engine told me that this morning there were 446 bulk lots of coins on sale in eBay's "ancient coins" category. That is quite disturbing if we take into account that some of them are “1000” coins, “500 coins”, “hundreds of coins” or a “kilogramme of ancient coins”. Matters are not so simple however; looking through these 446 lots (and I did) shows that not all are multiple dugups, a number are single coins, two coins or three similar coins (usually semi-clean of cleaned, so potentially from the splitting up of old ordered collections). I decided to ignore groups of three or less coins. Most of the ones I saw though were considerably more.

The breakdown of these coins was interesting, there were a large number of lots of Roman coins. There were was 232 Imperial, 33 “provincial” and 34 “Republican” (though in the case of bulk lots the division between the three was somewhat fuzzy, judging from the photos, the sellers of these items do not really have any idea of what the word "Republican” means in Roman numismatics - which in itself is telling). In total, on eBay this morning there were thus 299 lots of Roman coins – mostly uncleaned and many cases the seller exclaiming they were “direct from the excavator” and not infrequently specifying a region of the Balkans as the source.

There were 18 lots of Byzantine coins listed and another 18 in eBay stores. The coins from “Biblical Times” (so from the area of modern Palestine) were scattered throughout several categories (primarily “Other" and "Greek") when collected together there were 22, mostly so-called “widow’s mites” (how could they not be?). What is interesting is the eBay seller definition of the word “Medieval”. Being a medievalist, I was particularly interested in this category, but although eBay reckons it is selling 19 lots, there were really only seven (including a group from Poland but these were post-Medieval in fact). We are constantly told that collecting coins is a "gateway to history" (or some such claptrap). Well, here is aperiod of coin-rich history about a thousand years long which does not seem to be eliciting much interest and are invisible to the homegrown numismoscholars of eBay-land.

More interesting still was the section labeled “Greek”. This encapsulates very nicely the extent of the problems with the ancient coin trade. Misrepresentations abounded here. The first lot I clicked on were egregious [Bulgarian] fakes of Istrian (Istros, Thrace) coins. The second were copper alloy Seated goddess/seated king coins of Kashmir (like these ) of which there were several lots by the same seller mislabeled “Greek”. As mentioned above there were some Judean in this category too. In the end I discovered there were seven lots of Greek coins, though this includes two lots of Athenian tetradrachms being sold from Dubai and looking for all the world as part of a hoard (similar lots have been sold from here in the past both on eBay and V-coins). There is a section of ancient coins called “Persian, Indian and Asian” which has three real “lots” but 80 in eBay stores, mostly from India (which as we know restricts export of such material). Again Dubai is a source of some of the bigger lots in this and the next category, Islamic, today 20 lots. China the subject of the ACCG coin import stunt is represented by 12 lots (six listed, six stores) including three which would be covered by the US MOU if no paperwork is provided. I am sure though it was/will be.

What is significant is that most of the larger lots are clearly being offered by US sellers. This is more evidence that large quantities of the erdfrisch coins now entering the market are going to the American market. We should remember that many bulk lots of “dugups” are sold outside ebay from bulk sellers to smaller dealers or advertised on lists like “uncleaned coins”.

ACCG President Bill Puetz’s V-coins hosts 138 dealers in ancient coins. Today the homepage says it has 92,238 items on sale (so that is 13 times the total volume on offer on eBay today) and the joint worth of them is over 18 million dollars (aver. 196 dollars a coin). Using the search engine to find “lots” indicates that V-coin sellers have 1455 “lots” of coins… but searching through them quickly reveals that the name covers a multitude of sins. Some of them are not coins, and many are not even artifacts. In the first page of 200 items brought up by the search 65 were not bulk lots of coins, so although I found it a depressing experience to look through the whole site, let us assume this is representative and which would mean that the number of bulk lots being offered here is somewhere about 940. That is still more than eBay.

Vorsicht "erdfrisch"!

I have discussed earlier in my blog several times (for example here) the parallels between different types of shopkeepers, those selling food and those selling portable antiquities dug up "like potatoes" and suggesting that if one can document the origins of the items they trade in, the other can too.

One of the arts of selling vegetables of course is making them look as if just an hour or so they were still in the sun and wind in the fields. New potatoes for example look nicest in the marketplace if they look "erdfrish" as our German neighbours would say, fresh from the earth. Antiquities on the other hand are appreciated by their collectors if they have a patina that shows they have been in the soil an appreciable time, but also in the fabled "old collection " a fair amount of time too (at least since before 1970). So "erdfrisch" antiquities are really a bit of a no-no for the responsible collector unless, of course, they have clear documentation of their legitimate and legal and properly recorded removal from their original context and source country.

Last week in the German edition of the ‘popular science’ magazine “Focus” appeared an article by Noelani Waldenmaier called “EBAY: Vorsicht, "erdfrisch"!” ["EBay: beware, fresh from the soil"] (Focus 17/2009, 50) which gives a more balanced view of the reasons behind the recent German police investigations of collectors buying items on eBay from certain sellers which have aroused such anxiety in the US ancient coin-collecting world (for example, here and here). The collecting community gets its news mainly from the uninformed (or deliberately manipulative) rants in the hobby press such as Celator or Coin World and their forums and discussion groups. It is therefore nice to be able to point out that the mainstream "popular science" media which form and inform public opinion are taking a more balanced view than what can be contrasted with them as 'the lunatic fringe'.

Certainly the message is ‘caveat emptor’. It really is difficult to believe that all those “erdfrisch” coins by the kilogramme represent the splitting up of old collections (though one coin dealer tried to assure me that that was the case with the bulk lots he was selling..., though nasty old sceptic that I am I found this a rather weak and unverified protestation).

The focus article can apparently be downloaded here by those who missed it.

A taste of things to come or just a load of gas?

I’ve been unable to find out more about an anecdote which recently appeared on the ancient artifacts forum here and here.

Apparently a collector in north western USA (Idaho) “just this past week” had two local customs-FBI gentlemen visit her and they “told her they noted she was actively buying artifacts on ebay”, they apparently examined all the items in her collection and collected the names of sellers. The items concerned were apparently Maya objects, import of which is restricted in the USA depending on what country they come from.

Now, if true, and not just a one-off fluke, it suggests that US authorities might be beginning to observe internet sales more carefully in the same way as in Germany. We all recall the fuss about that from US collectors a few weeks back. This is one to watch.

Antiquities Market "undermined"?

Charles Stanish (director of the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology and a professor of anthropology at UCLA) recently opines (Forging Ahead, Or, how I learned to stop worrying and love eBay) that “the Web has forever distorted the antiquities trafficking market in a positive way”. He argues that the growing sophistication of forgeries and the drop in prices of antiquities on the global market brought about by internet sales is undercutting the market for real looted items which in the absence of any documentation of legitimate origins, the buyer cannot distinguish from fakes. He says "it is just conceivable that online commerce will actually put a lot of antiquities looters and traffickers out of business by the sheer volume of sales and quality of products that fool even the experts". Speaking mainly of material of South and Central American origin, he suggests that:

many of the primary "producers" of the objects have shifted from looting sites to faking antiquities. I've been tracking eBay antiquities for years now, and from what I can tell, this shift began around 2000, about five years after eBay was established. People who used to make a few dollars selling a looted artifact to a middleman in their village can now produce their own "almost-as-good-as-old" objects and go directly to a person in a nearby town who has an eBay vendor account. They will receive the same amount or even more than they could have received for actual antiquities. […]The economics of these transactions are quite simple. Because the eBay phenomenon has substantially reduced total costs by eliminating middlemen, brick-and-mortar stores, high-priced dealers, and other marginal expenses, the local eBayers and craftsmen can make more money cranking out cheap fakes than they can by spending days or weeks digging around looking for the real thing. It is true that many former and potential looters lack the skills to make their own artifacts. But the value of their illicit digging decreases every time someone buys a "genuine" Moche pot for $35, plus shipping and handling. In other words, because the low-end antiquities market has been flooded with fakes that people buy for a fraction of what a genuine object would cost, the value of the real artifacts has gone down as well, making old-fashioned looting less lucrative. The value of real antiquities is also impacted by the increased risk that the object for sale is a fake. The likelihood of reselling an authentic artifact for more money is diminished each year as more fakes are produced. […]It was only a matter of time before a few workshops producing the cheap fakes started turning out reproductions that can fool even supposed experts like me. A number of these workshops have swamped the higher-end market with beautiful pieces that require intensive study by specialists and high-cost tests to authenticate. This manufacturing business never could have developed on such a scale without the Internet, and these forgers have forever transformed the antiquities market into something that we could not have imagined just a decade ago.

The author suggests therefore that the days of the no-questions asked buying and selling may be numbered, as dealers will have to be able to show the origins of the artefact they are claiming is ancient in order to demonstrate to the buyer that it is not a sophisticated recent fake. Standish says:

From the professional's point of view, there are really three kinds of "antiquities" on eBay. About 30 percent are obvious fakes or tourist art that can be detected by looking at the pictures, even the fuzzy ones. [...]Another five percent or so are probably real, while the rest are in the ambiguous category of "I would have to hold it in my hand to be able to make an informed decision." This latter category has grown fast. In the first years of eBay, I observed about a 50-50 real-to-fake ratio in Andean artifacts. About five years ago, my informal assessment was that about 95 percent were obvious fakes and the rest were real or dubious. This was the period when the workshops first went into high gear; the market was flooded with low-end junk. Now, the workshops are producing much higher-quality fakes, increasing the category of ambiguous objects now available. I base these estimates not only on what I see on eBay, but also from my occasional work with U.S. Customs, in which I help authenticate objects.

What is more important for archaeology is the assessment that "the experts who study the objects are sometimes being trained on fakes", the same of course will go for the dealers on whose "reputation" and ability to separate fakes from real and potentially looted artefacts collectors pin their trust. Stanish mentions "the work of the famous Brigido Lara, who created tens of thousands of fakes in the 1950s and '60s, practically creating his own "ancient" culture in Veracruz, Mexico, in the process". The Lie Became Great.

While certainly I would accept that there is abundant evidence that the majority of people buying "antiquities" through internet sales outlets seem to be uninformed and naive individuals in addition - to judge from what they bid on - apparently devoid for the most part of any sense of "style" and aesthetics enabling them to spot pieces that simply 'do not look right', I think Dr Stanish is overstating the case by suggesting that because of the number of gullible people buying forgeries, the looting problem is to some extent over. What applies to pre-Columbian antiquities coming into the USA cannot be extrapolated to the whole global market. It does not affect for example those collectors that go out and "do it themselves", like the damage caused to Europe's archaeological record by metal detectorists. I think also we should recognise that the prevalence of fakes is an indicator that the most accessible parts of the archaeological record have already had the collectable portable antiquities collected away.

US police would not fight culture crime?

Culture Property Observer, ACCG President (?) Peter Tompa tries to save face after accepting that if he’d checked out the facts of the case before posting his “German police run amok…” blog post, he’d have discovered that the story of the German investigations of collectors was not quite as the Californian coin dealer had led us all to believe (it’s what he is now calling a “different perspective”). So now he claims:

it is gross overkill to seize an entire coin collection based on a few coins purchased openly on a commercial website like eBay that allegedly came from an illicit source. The" little guy" simply does not have the financial resources to contest these seizures or the stomach to stand up to police intimidation that demands a collector surrender his entire collection to avoid possible prosecution.

I’d like to ask the lawyer how it is in Washington. The police investigate somebody (let it be an unemployed German immigrant) for receiving four stolen items, the police have proof he bought them. They could be stolen cars, TVs, ipods, mobile phones, Old Master paintings, whatever. On a visit to the suspect's property, they find another fifty three items of the same nature there, and the person already under investigation is unable to present any documentation proving legal origins of those other items either. What is the Washington policeman to do? Is it really “police intimidation” for the investigating officer to impound these other items for the duration of the investigation? Or is it a policeman actually doing the job they are paid to do? Is it really "overkill" to conduct an investigation of crimes like theft and handling stolen goods thoughly? I wonder if Mr Tompa has ever been the victim of burglary or vehicle theft?

Controlling the Illicit Antiquities Trade in the UK?

Kate Clark the author of the recently published review of the PAS would appear to have a sly sense of humour. On page 34 of her text she writes:

The scheme adds value to the work of the British Museum, including its role in implementing the Treasure Act and related policy issues – in particular the control of the illicit trade in antiquities.

The BM controls the illicit trade in antiquities in Britain? No, it does nothing of the sort. The 'Treasure Unit' in the BM has a memorandum of understanding with eBay by means of which it polices eBay for undeclared Treasure items. Staff members pore over the listings contacting sellers about items which they feel contravenes the Treasure Act. Most of the time the seller tells them it is “from abroad” and there the matter ends, because “No British law has been broken”. This is despite the wording of the 2003 Dealing in Cultural Property (Offences) Act concerning the scope of the definition of “tainted artefact”. The British Museum does not attempt to uphold this law (still less promote the respecting of the laws of the 'countries of origin') in its “policing” of eBay. Perhaps from a logistic point of view it is entirely understandable, but from the archaeological one there is a rather more troubling ethical dimension involved. An additional ethical problem is the presence of enormous quantities of fake artefacts which any antiquities collector will tell you being sold in great quantities through eBay as genuine (looted) ones. I am pretty sure that the BM has the expertise to spot the suspicious scarab, the spurious shabti, the dodgy didrachm, and yet depite the BM having cast an eye over them, they pass muster and continue to be sold (misrepresenting fake antiquities and selling them as genuine is also against British law).

The buyer is told the antiquity sales on the UK eBay are “policed by the BM” and have the right to trust that what they buy is therefore legitimate and authentic – which I am sure is what eBay would tell them. No, Ms Clark, the British Museum does NOT have any control of the illicit trade in antiquities in London or Britain as a whole.

Personally though I do think that something called “the Portable Antiquities Scheme”, adequately resourced could be an effective way of putting into practice HM Government’s declared intent of “cleaning up the illicit antiquities market” in Britain which for several years now has remained just empty words.

Milton Keynes: Metal Detected Treasure Lost its Context

John Couchman, of Hemel Hempstead, and Lorraine Ayton, of Bedford, carelessly lost the contact address of two metal detecting "acquaintances" of theirs, and only knew their names were Stuart and Tracey and that they had left the country. Now "Stew" and "Trace" (I wonder if they were Central Searchers?) moved away from the area but not before asking John and Loraraine to sell a few items for them which they had found in summer 2004. The sad thing is that although the sale raised 205 quid, Couchman and Ayton did not know where to send the money. Now if you are out there Stew and Trace, John and Lorraine have some money for you. But they are not the only people who'd like to talk to you about those finds. The hoard of 15 Bronze Age items which was bought on eBay by Jeroen Zuiderwijk, a Dutch collector was repatriated and declared Treasure by Milton Keynes Coroner Rodney Corner (the same one as at Cold Brayfield) at an inquest in 2005. The only trouble is, nobody knows where "Stew and Trace" found the loot, and so the landowner for example cannot receive their share of the reward. In fact, not to put too fine a point on it, what Stew and Trace did was very naughty. By law, they are supposed to report such a find within 14 days of discovery, not get somebody else to flog it off on the Internet. Milton Keynes does not seem to be having much luck with "metal detectorists".

How many more national treasures are being dug up and sold off abroad on the sly by anonymous metal detectors like "Stew" and "Trace"?

Perhaps the story had a happy end, maybe a Central Searcher "metal detectorist" found Stew and Trace's forwarding address in the end and the matter has been cleared up. I really do not see how it is possible that the finders could not be traced. It's a bit lame to get the stuff back from Holland and all you can say about its context and archaeological significance is "It does, though, throw up evidence of the Bronze Age and that there was bronze-smithing in the area." Duh!

Photo: The "Stew and Trace" Bronze Age hoard. Found in 2004 "somewhere in England".