Mildenhall Treasure

Mildenhall Treasure

Mildenhall Treasure in the British Museum
Material	Silver
Created	4th century AD
Discovered	1942
Present location	British Museum

The Mildenhall Treasure is a large hoard of masterpieces of Roman silver tableware from the 4th century AD, and by far the most valuable Roman objects artistically and by weight of bullion in Britain. It was found at West Row, near Mildenhall, Suffolk. It consists of over thirty items and includes the Great Dish weighing over 8kg alone.

The collection is on view in the British Museum because of its immense importance and value, and replicas are on show in the local museum at Mildenhall.

The hoard was discovered while ploughing in January 1942 by Gordon Butcher, who removed it from the ground with help from Sydney Ford, for whom he was working at the time. Many details of the discovery remained uncertain, not least because it took place in wartime. Apparently they did not at first recognise the objects for what they were, though Ford collected ancient objects. Ford cleaned the pieces and displayed them in his house, using some of them as daily utensils and some, such as the Great Dish, on special occasions with the family. Ford declared the hoard to the authorities in 1946 after a knowledgable friend had seen them in his home. An inquest was held in the summer of that year, when the find was legally declared "treasure trove" and acquired by the British Museum in London. Academic opinion at the time was generally reluctant to believe that such fine-quality Roman silver could possibly have been used in Roman Britain, and so there were many imaginative rumours and even doubts that this was a genuine British find at all. The numerous well documented discoveries of high-quality Roman material in recent decades, including the Hoxne Hoard, have set all such doubts to rest.

More recently, Richard Hobbs drew the attention of the academic world to the importance of the part-fictional account by Roald Dahl, and has addressed the issues surrounding the actual finding. In Dahl's version of events, subsequently confirmed by Ford's grandson, Ford was fully aware of the significance of the find, but could not bear to part with the treasure. He kept it and restored it in secret, but two of the spoons left out on display were seen by an unexpected visitor, Dr. Hugh Fawcett.

Ford and Butcher were awarded £1000 each as finders, although not necessarily the full ex gratia reward since the find had not been correctly reported.