HENRY VII ANGEL
PERIOD: 1502 - 1504 LOCATION: LINCOLNSHIRE, UK MATERIAL: GOLD
A day to remember.
Any metal detectorist knows that it just isn’t everyday you go out and walk over that gold. But it’s in everyone’s dreams, on everyone’s bucket lists and the top find in every display cabinet. Sometimes it takes folk years to find the gold (we’ve heard), others walk right over it on their first time out, for us it took a good few months, 6 or 7 months to be exact and we haven’t stopped talking about it since. I mean why would you!
Now it had been a really tough and brutal winter dig, it was the feral season and we were stuck traipsing the pasture slopes working hard for what treasures we could pull from the land. There was a particular field high up on the ridgeline that we had been working over for a few outings and that was where our day began. We were treated to a lovely decorated trapezoidal buckle but that was about it and we were all in all feeling rather disheartened. It was also raining … relentlessly all day.
Looking down on our permission we decided to make an abrupt change for the day and head down to a rather large pasture field that we hadn’t hit much. For some reason we love a digging hike during the winter and like to trail round all of the pasture side of our permission raking up tens of thousands of steps every outing. So we head on down, scaling the various gates and fences to the final spot for the day. The weather has really turned at this point and what had been light, constant rain had become torrential torrents, but still, because we really have this digging bug, we continued undeterred wanting just one more, one more good find to end the day.
We were treated to a lovely decorated trapezoidal buckle but that was about it and we were all in all feeling rather disheartened. It was also raining … relentlessly all day.
Well we searched and we searched and dusk was starting to draw in so rather dejected with only a buckle to show for our torrential day in the rain we started to head out towards the gate. That was when the most unbelievable moment of the day happened and a strong rainbow broke out over us with one end landing right in the opposite field to where we were stood. We both looked at each other and immediately knew we had to swing towards the end of the rainbow, like what are the chances we would be foolish not to. So we head off, knackered, and find a spent cartridge. Some ‘gold under the rainbow’ we thought.
Really on our way out now and certain we’ve had our luck for the day we dig ‘one last signal’ before we get to the gate and head home, a pinger according to Lucie. A strong 19 - 21 VDI on the Minelab Vanquish 340 and only registering as 2 spades deep. Pinpointed, it’s time to dig, flipping back that clod of earth will be one that we both never forget. It really isn't every day a mint Henry VII Gold Angel is just lying there staring up at you. It literally took your breath away. Upon first reveal Ellie replaced the earth quickly in a panic making Lucie come round from her filming position to experience what it was like to reveal such a find. A day we had dreamed about since first picking up the coil and shovel came to realisation with not just any old gold but a gold hammered.
That gold hammered turned out to be none other than a Henry VII Gold Angel, it was minted at the Tower Mint in London and, bearing the Greyhound Mintmark, between the years 1502 - 1504. The Angel coin was brought in by King Edward IV in 1465 to replace the Gold Noble, it was based on the French Angelot at the time and had a value of 6 shillings and 8 pence.
The Gold Noble was already an iconic coin but the Angel went out to cement itself into culture and society leaving many hidden hints to its legacy. A large part of its high cultural impact was due to the legend and superstition that surrounded these coins. This was based around the depiction of the Archangel Michael on the obverse as well as their common use as ‘touchpieces’.
So we head off, knackered, and find a spent cartridge. Some ‘gold under the rainbow’ we thought.
Tudor and Medieval England was rife with various plagues and diseases that would sweep through towns and cities with no available cure leaving only death in their wake. Prior to the ascension of Henry VII to the throne in 1485 the black death had already culled 30 - 40% of England’s population, desolating villages and leaving others on their knees with death rates as high as 80 - 90%. But it wasn't just the black death people had to fear with bubonic plague outbreaks common as well as various infectious diseases such as cholera and dysentery, all of which could kill.
It won’t come as a surprise that this level of plague and disease left many people desperate for any solution that could cure the results of such an epidemic. One such solution was based around the magical healing powers of the monarch and angel coins particularly. It was strongly believed that the monarch’s touch could cure the ailments of those it was bestowed upon and that this ‘power’ could be transferred into a rare gold coin through the power of touch, creating a ‘touchpiece’.
There were large ‘touching ceremonies’ actually held during the middle ages where the monarch would transfer this power with an audience and sufferers would be given gold coins to either wear or hold. The angel coin was a common choice for touchpieces, potentially linked to their strong religious iconography or simply as a rare gold coin.
The obverse of our angel depicts the Archangel Michael slaying the dragon, a retelling of the bible story the War of the Angels where Lucifer (the Devil) was cast from heaven. St Michael also has a long history of providing spiritual protection to the royal person linking this iconography to the beliefs and superstition surrounding angels being used as touchpieces. As our coin was found not too far from a Medieval village that was abandoned as a result of desolation by the plagues of the Medieval and early Tudor era there is a strong likelihood that it could have been used as a touchpiece.
Have you heard of the ‘Angel Islington’, the ‘Angel Inn’, in fact most public places that contain a name or reference to ‘Angel’ are believed to actually be referring to the Angel Coin. A coin that transcended the Medieval and Tudor wallet and became a highly cultural and spiritual object. What a coin to have as our first gold find, it really is going to take some digging and maybe just a pinch of luck to beat that!
