A retiree stumbled upon a large, shiny object while metal detecting in the midlands of England. It turned out to be an extremely rare Bronze Age clothing accessory.
Jonathan Needham found the hand-sized object in Staffordshire — located about 150 miles northwest of London — in 2022, according to a news release from the British Museum.
Needham, a former tree surgeon, initially figured it was a discarded drawer handle, he told the BBC.
But after posting a photo of it online, respondents immediately informed him that it was actually an ancient golden artifact, the BBC reported.
“We were punching the roof at what we had found,” he told the outlet.
He then handed the object over to museum officials, who further determined it was a 3,000-year-old “dress fastener.”
The skillfully crafted accessory was possibly used to hold together a skirt, dress or cloak — likely of an “important” individual, according to the museum.
It probably originated hundreds of miles away in Ireland, where Bronze Age smiths were “producing some of the most exquisite goldwork in Europe,” officials said.
The gold fastener is only the seventh such find in England or Wales, making it extremely uncommon.
It will likely be handed over to a museum for display, officials said.
It was just one of the 53,490 archaeological finds, including a record 1,378 “treasure cases,” reported in the United Kingdom in 2022.
“The record-breaking figures highlight the huge contribution that members of the public are making to increasing archaeological knowledge in the UK today,” officials said.
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