What could be more fun that being a member of the Rolling Stones, playing to packed stadiums of adoring fans? If you ask former-Stone Bill Wyman, the answer is simple...digging through the British mud with a metal detector looking for lost Roman coins and artifacts.
Wyman has been an outspoken advocate of the British metal detecting hobby for years, culminating in a top-selling book he wrote on the subject last year. In the book he published many of the finds he accumulated over the years since he started the hobby.
Given the relative density of the country and its long period of habitation, British soil is literally littered with fragments of history. Thousands of ordinary British citizens, many organized into clubs throughout various villages and cities, share Wyman's passion regularly spend hours at a stretch walking across empty fields that once might have been the site of a Bronze Age settlement, Roman country market or medieval manor home.
This weekend, Wyman and some of his detecting compatriots are teaming up with Suffolk County Council's archaeology team to carry out a controlled surface finds study of an area that once was an Ancient Roman villa. Reports from the field indicate that Wyman hasn't discovered any rolling stones yet, but has turned up more than 20 Roman coins and other artifacts. Click for story.
Photo to right shows archaeologists, equipped with a metal detector and other tools, at work this summer on a Roman settlement site in south-central England. (Courtesy T.O'S images)
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Posted by: metal detector | December 03, 2005 at 09:41 AM