A man using a metal detector to search a freshly plowed carrot field in Switzerland found a large, ornate set of jewelry dating to the Bronze Age – as well as other surprising items, including a bear tooth, a beaver tooth and a fossilized shark tooth, local officials said this week.
Franz Zahn made the unusual discovery in August while “out and about in a freshly harvested carrot field” in Güttingen, about 50 miles northeast of Zurich, Thurgau canton officials said in a news release Monday. Zahn initially found a bronze disc and immediately realised it was an “extraordinary discovery”, so he contacted local authorities.
A team of experts identified the discovery as a necklace and a large jewellery set from the Middle Bronze Age, which dates to around 1500 BC, officials said. Archaeologists later excavated a block of soil where the discovery was made and found a host of other artefacts – including rings, gold wire spirals and more than 100 amber beads.
Experts also made other “surprising” finds – a bronze arrowhead, a beaver tooth, a bear tooth, a fossilised shark tooth, a rock crystal and a small ammonite.
In total, eight gold spirals and 14 bronze spiked discs with eyelets were recovered, indicating “costume jewellery” worn by women some 3,500 years ago, according to the press release.
Local officials said the unusual discovery raised several questions: “Was a jewellery box hidden here? Were the bear tooth, rock crystal and selected fossils and stones a collection of curiosities or souvenirs? Or is there more to it?”
Experts noted that the array of objects found were said to have “a special, protective or healing effect” and could have been worn as a kind of amulet.
Officials said Zahn was very familiar with Güttingen and had previously made other discoveries, including scrap metal and objects from the Iron and Bronze Ages. The artefacts are being restored so that they can be displayed at the archaeological museum in Frauenfeld, Switzerland.
A video released by the canton of Thurgau shows the jewellery being restored in a laboratory.
The unusual find in Switzerland follows other recent discoveries of ancient treasures by people with metal detectors in Europe.
Earlier this month, two sets of coins found by metal detectors in Wales turned out to be Roman treasure, officials confirmed.
In September, a Norwegian family searching for a lost earring in their garden instead discovered artefacts dating back more than 1,000 years. Just weeks before that, officials revealed that a man with a metal detector had made the “gold find of the century” in Norway.
