Detectingwales.com Rally 66 - Spiders and Halves!

[CUT/HALF]

Great finds HAMMERRHOID   . Not only a nice CUT/HALF, but that coin weight ain't too bad either. Very well done on the finds and I look forward to meeting you again on another Detectingwales.com rally if not before.
All the best in the field
CUT/HALF

[celticspikey]

It was about time the DW clan returned to our Rooksbridge site, which is historically the scene of the original Hammerdfest. Sunday saw us return in our masses – it wasn’t quite a fest but still a productive day.

The fields to play with consisted of pasture, stubble and rolled. Following the fantastic overview by our resident Rooksbbridge expert, Chef we were off with hope in our hearts and mud on our boots.

The first find of the day came from the booming voice of Manicdev who was sporting an early Medieval buckle – a beauty to add to his collection. He was quickly followed by a finder with an early bag seal that should be dateable. Proconsol managed a bag seal of his own which for all the world seemed to be adorned with a phallus – hints at those pesky Romans perhaps. It was beginning to appear that despite our previous visits that there were still decent finds to be made. Who says a field is ever “Done”.

The detecting grapevine brought early news that Colonel Trautman’s favourite Special Forces operative had unearthed a Lizzy Sixpence. Sure enough, a beaming, bearded, and hairy Rambo had hit paydirt again with a coin of the Virgin Queen, who lets face it if she had ever met Rambo wouldn’t have kept her nickname for long!

He added to it later in the day with the first of many cut halves that appeared on a regular basis. I think at the time we speculated that it was a voided longcross of Henry III.

In the interest of friendly competition, Dawson was giving Rambo a run for the money with two hammered coins of his own – a Tudor penny and another cut half.

Whilst standing on the edge of the pasture, I became aware of a mystical shimmering light that seemed to be covering the grass. Being a believer in omens and lucky symbols I worked my way towards it. It was no prophecy of fortune though. Instead it was the largest web of spider I have ever seen. I was covered from my shins down in spiders and silk. For the rest of the day everyone I spoke to seemed to have a small spider hanging from their nose, cap or machine. There were literally thousands of arachnids everywhere!

After lunch my spider senses started tingling again with the arrival of another two cut halves. These were quickly followed by Dale with a whopping 30gram chunk of silver necklace broken in five parts. Guess what? He also had found a cut half!

I travelled down to the rally this morning with Mike and newbie Gareth, and was delighted to see a beaming Mike come towards me at the end of the day with a penny that I immediately recognised as being Edward 1st and I dare say a class of 10cf or thereabouts. If you believe I can ID coins that easily I’ll tell you another one! The credit for the ID goes to The Doc.

The temperature plummeted at about 3.30pm and soon members started heading home, probably with more than a few extra passengers of the arachnid variety.

I saw a total of 8 hammered coins on the day, which is a fair return in my book. I dare say there were a few other finds I didn’t see, so please add them to this post. I have never seen so many cut halfs and I think we can say for certain whatever was going on in the area cost half a penny!

Until next time

Keep the faith
Neil

Great pictures Great finds Great weather Great write up Great organisation Great bunch of guys & girls even the bloody spiders were Great, well may be not

[Dryland]

Yeh, but what abour the rally 

[Da Monkey]

Nice write up Neil  Great to get out and meet up with everyone, Ken Comet followed us all the way down the M5 and then up the wrong lane when we got to the village LOL [my fault there...] Not the most abundant rally for me, but still very enjoyable.  Went to the beach later as we Hereford lot don't get to paddle much  found £1.20 in small change, guess those soft Zummerzet locals dont go bathing much this time of year ...

At least we repatriated loads of Zummerzet spiders to their new home in Herefordshire where they can sample some real zider , I've never seen so many of the little buggers traveling around on their threads in the wind, the field was white with 'em, tried to capture in the attached photos but it doesn't do it justice    Deadlock stopped for 10 minutes and had trouble finding his headphones for the little blighters

Soaked the coil in a puddle to try and get them off, but that just made the threads amalgamate into a layer of silk, its not hard to believe the silk is stronger than steel in tesile strength I can tell you    How does such a small spider contain so much of the stuff up its bum ??  boggles the mind.

See what you think of the new design of Spider Coil on my Deus...

Thanks for the rally guys, see you all on the next one I hope.

[Mike]

great write up as usual neil , enjoyed the day very much 

[Chef Geoff]

And there was me thinking it was only Tesoro that made web coils

[Da Monkey]

 

[legio11augustus]

love the coin weight but how is the date so wide nearly covering 180yrs .surely wasnt being used for that amount of period ,or is it just to difficult to narrow down the date

[Chef Geoff]

The Ecu was around practically unchanged for 380 years, if you think of a coin like our Florin which changed (in name only) to the 2 shilling piece, that was around for a similar period

[legio11augustus]

crazy 380 years .thanks for info geoff

[nobby]

Enjoyed reading that thanks Neil.....  who won the hammy sweep stake?

[handyman [Alan}]

good read Neil .. well written.

It's far more informative and grammatically correct than a certain vexatious bloggers blog!

[beachboy (viv)]

neil,again another great report and another brilliant D/W rally well done everyone.viv

[legio11augustus]

vexatious.its vexatious using that word 

[HAMMERRHOID]

love the coin weight but how is the date so wide nearly covering 180yrs .surely wasnt being used for that amount of period ,or is it just to difficult to narrow down the date

Nice to read that you liked the coin weight that I found at Rooksbridge , its only the 2nd one that I have found in 30 years of detecting . The other one that I have has an angel on it and the flo said it was from around 1500 . Hope to meet you at the next dig .
Cheers HAMMERRHOID