Staffordshire Hoard saved as £3.3m appeal hits target

The Staffordshire Hoard, the largest collection of Anglo-Saxon gold ever found, has been saved for the nation after an appeal raised the £3.285 million needed to buy it.

The target was reached on 23 March, three weeks before the deadline, after a grant of £1.285 million from the National Heritage Memorial Fund.

A joint purchase

The hoard will be owned jointly by Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery and the Potteries Museum and Art Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent. The two museums launched a public appeal, coordinated by the Art Fund, after the treasure was valued last November.

Under the Treasure Act, a museum that wants to acquire treasure must pay a reward equal to its value, which is shared between the finder and the landowner. If the money had not been raised by 17 April, the hoard might have been sold on the open market and broken up.

A remarkable response

The appeal attracted donations from thousands of people in the region, across the country and around the world, alongside grants from charitable funds. Visitors to exhibitions of the hoard in Birmingham and Stoke-on-Trent added money to donation boxes, and schools, businesses and community groups held fundraising events.

The discovery

The hoard was found in July 2009 by Terry Herbert, a metal detector enthusiast, in a field near Hammerwich, near Lichfield in Staffordshire. Over the following days, archaeologists recovered hundreds of gold and silver objects, many decorated with garnets.

It was declared treasure by the coroner for South Staffordshire, and pieces were taken to the British Museum for cataloguing and initial conservation.

Why it matters

The hoard dates from the seventh century, when the area was part of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia. Most of the objects are fittings from weapons, such as sword hilts, and experts say the craftsmanship is of the highest quality. It is larger in quantity than the famous treasure found at Sutton Hoo in 1939.

When a selection of objects went on show at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery soon after the discovery, thousands of people queued for hours to see them.

What happens next

With the money raised, a long programme of conservation and research can begin. Many of the objects are bent, broken or covered in soil, and experts expect it to take years to clean, study and understand them fully.

A new fundraising effort is expected to follow, to pay for that research and for permanent displays in Birmingham and Stoke-on-Trent. For now, the museums are celebrating the fact that the hoard will stay together, in the part of England where it was buried almost 1,400 years ago.