The Snettisham Hoards

Since 1948, spectacular discoveries have been made on a wooded hillside at Snettisham, overlooking the Norfolk coast, close to Hunstanton. The findspot, at Ken Hill, has become known as the ‘gold field’ because of the large number of Iron Age gold and silver-alloy neckings or torcs recovered from the site. Known collectively as the ’Snettisham Treasure’, these objects represent one of the largest collections of ancient precious metal jewellery ever discovered. Following a comprehensive scientific study of the objects from the site, a book about the Snettisham Treasure has recently been published by the British Museum. This presentation will discuss the major findings from the book and try to explain why so many precious metal objects were buried at Snettisham during the Late Iron Age, around 60 BC.

Jody Joy is a Senior Curator at the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge. He is a specialist in the archaeology of the European Iron Age, and prior to joining Cambridge in 2014, he was Curator of European Iron Age Collections at the British Museum.