22.3.2019 He discovered coins in the forest with a detector

Three years ago, treasure hunter Vladimír Vaník discovered a treasure in the forest near Kostelce. With the help of a metal detector he found nineteen silver groschen and a coin fragment. They date back to the reign of Václav IV.

When he was walking with the metal detector through the trees, he registered a signal. So he started digging and found 600-year-old coins. Exactly nineteen coins and a fragment of one incomplete coin. "I can't believe that I have discovered a piece of the ancient history of the town of Kostelce," remarked the native of Kostelce, who now lives in Liblice near Český Brod.

The coins were affected by humidity, which is why their technical condition was poor. The money was corroded, so only seven of them could be dated. They have the inscription "WENZESLAVS TERCIVS" and date from the reign of Wenceslaus II (1378 to 1419).

The depot was acquired by the Municipal Museum of Pottery in Kostelec nad Černými lesy. The coins were probably hidden by someone during the Hussite Wars. They could also have come from some dishonest activity such as robbery. However, the owner has never recovered the coins.

A year earlier, another prospector with a metal detector - Oldřich Eder from Jevany - also found the treasure in the woods near Kostelce. Specifically, sixteen Prague grosz and half of a broken grosz. Eder behaved in an exemplary manner and handed over the find to the Czernokostelec Museum, where the coins added to the collection of the medieval history of the town.

Eder discovered silver Prague grosz with a diameter of 28 mm, which were minted in Vlašský dvůr in Kutná Hora from 1300. Among the coins were six pieces with the inscription "KAROLVS PRIMVS". They were created during the reign of Charles IV. The other ten coins bore the inscription "WENZESLAVS TERCIVS".

The coins were also probably deposited in the forest by an unknown person during the Hussite Wars and after the war he was unable to retrieve the depot. Sixteen groschen in the fourteenth century corresponded to a weekly salary of a carpenter. For one grosz you could buy a piece of butter, for three grosz an axe and for three to eight grosz a pair of leather shoes.

In the fifteenth century, sixteen groszy was equal to an average monthly wage. One grosz bought a hen or eighteen bricks. A warm coat cost fifteen groschen...

Sources: www.kostelecncl.cz