My Diary of our trip to Croatia 2013 - Part 4

Friday  day 7 - detecting day 5

This was to be the last days detecting and there were plans to cover several sites in quick succession, to see how well my Minelab detectors would perform on “worked out” sites.

The first was a field on the outskirts of Vinkovci which had previously produced a lot of iron-age material, including silver Staters. The field was a long thin rectangular shape with a rough dirt track road along its full length. Steve told us the finds were concentrated near the road, becoming sparser the further you walk into the field. My aim was to find a silver Stater like the ones I’d seen in the museum.

I started the CTX 3030, still fitted with the CTX17 coil and I proceeded to search close to the road. My first signal dug was a coke can followed by a nice crisp two-way signal next to its hole. Digging down I saw something green and picking it up I realized I was holding a La Tène iron-age brooch unlike any I’d found before. I continued the search finding a couple of roman coins, they seem to be everywhere in Croatia. Steve then announced the hour was up and it was time to move onto another site he wanted us to search. As I was making my way to the Land Rovers I got a nice medium-toned signal, and digging down I found a silver coin with a big fat horse on it. I‘d found the silver Celtic coin I was after.

The next site was an hour away and most of the journey was off-road. When we arrived Steve announced this site was the best he’d ever searched. The site had produced material from all periods but the Roman finds had been the most spectacular. The only problem… it hadn’t been cultivated and was still in maze stubble, the stuff that doesn’t move even if you kick it!

We’d come too far to simply drive away so we got out the detectors. I assembled the GPX 5000 from its backpack, fitted a 16” coiltek mono coil and started searching. I’d chosen a mono coil because Steve had told us that the iron artefacts he’d found were in good condition, so he argued it was worth digging the iron. I had the detector on a loud speaker so he could hear what was happening. I received some strong surface signals, and although I told him we should ignore them as they were obviously iron, he insisted we dug them…. He soon saw I was right and left me to dig just the deeper targets.

The first Roman find was a broken Roman brooch, followed by a coin in good condition of the emperor Gordian. Moving a further few feet along a tractor track, I got a sweet faint two way signal. I turned to Steve and said “this is the type of signal I’ve been looking for” and sure enough I recovered a lovely Roman brooch at a depth of about 12”.

At this point we unanimously agreed we’d had enough of maze stubble, and we proceeded to the next site where Steve had found medieval silver coins and rings. This site was set in winter wheat and was flat and easy to detect. Steve told us that the productive area was large and that the targets would be sparse. He told us to lookout for his favourite coin, a hammered coin that had been previously found on this site. I reached for the CTX 3030 fitted with the 17” coil, and started to rough grid the area, zig zagging across the 4-acre area.

Richard had the first find of note, a medieval bronze ring, so I moved closer to where he was searching. I dug a few pieces of low-toned foil, before receiving a sweet medium-toned response from my detector. Digging down an inch or so, the target was out of the hole and I was soon holding a small thick hammered coin. I shouted over to Steve that I had possibly found his favourite hammered coin. I dropped it into his hand and he said it wasn’t, it was an earlier coin from the 11^th century. He then looked at it closer and could see it was thicker than normal because it was actually two coins stuck together. Two coins stuck together could mean it was part of a hoard.

I marked the find point and started to grid the area, but as time was short I had to soon abandon the search leaving it to Steve to continue the search next year.

So we packed away the detectors and we were on the move again, this time to a virgin site Steve had seen on Google Earth. He wanted help to see why there was a dark patch in the corner of a field, which was a short drive away.

We parked up beside the corner of the field, grabbed our detectors and crossed the two-metre deep “V” cut ditch surrounding the field. Straight away I was into Roman coins, digging a nice coin of Aurelian. Richard dug a contempory forgery of Nero, so it was obvious the dark area Steve had seen on Google Earth was in fact remains of a Roman settlement.

By now we were all quite hungry, so we stopped for pizza before driving to the last field of the day.

This was a short drive to a village called Nuštar, which was completely devastated in the recent war. The field was on the outskirts, and had been searched for many years by Steve and two friends. Steve didn’t think we would find much, but we soon surprised him with a steady stream of large Roman coins. It was while mid-stream, so to speak, that I got a lovely two way signal under my CTX17 coil. Digging down about a foot reveiled a lovely Roman plate brooch, a type I often find in the UK. Steve was over the moon. He said they were very rare in Croatia, and would be a great addition to the Vinkovci Museum collection.

This had been a very successful days detecting, hitting all my target goals for the day.

That evening we were invited to a bar to sample some traditional Slivovitz, a locally distilled plum brandy. This was served with a plate of cured sliced meats including a spicy meat called Kulen. These Slivovitz and Kulen were so good we arranged to collect some for our return to England. At the end of the evening we walked back to our hotel, passing a shop with what can only be described as the most evil looking manikin ever.

Saturday day 8 – the drive home.

Our adventure was nearly over and it was time to hand everything over our finds to Hrvoje, Vinkovci’s most enlightened archaeologist, before traveling home to England. This was done outside our hotel over a cup of coffee. We showed him our finds, and then I showed him where we found everything on the Google map within Xchange 2. He was very impressed with this technology, and could see this would help in recording accurately. 

So we said our farewell and loaded up the Land Rover for the long trip home. Steve then offered us a final site to search “on the way”. I jumped at the opportunity of this bonus search. We followed him to the outskirts of Vinkovci, down a track onto a rough ploughed field. He explained how this was a site that had produced Bonze-Age material of the Copper-Age, and he was interested to if our machines could find more early artifacts. I set up the CTX 3030 and walk down the field to a slight ridge. Detecting wasn’t easy as the rough ploughed soil had baked hard in the sun, but eventually I got a nice high pitch target response which was typical of a copper alloy find. Digging down I found the tip of a 3000+ years old Bronze Age spear. I gridded the area but failed to find any more finds. I then turned and worked my way towards the hedge at the top of the field. Here I started to find Roman coins in good condition. Richard found a nice Denarius of Antoninus Pius and a small knife handle depicting a roman god.

This was a very enjoyable site, but time had finally run out for us. We handed over these final finds, said our goodbyes yet again and set off back home to England.

We arrived back late Sunday morning after 23 hours, taking turns to drive, and only stopping to refuel and drink coffee and eat snacks.

All in all this was a very enjoyable trip, one I hope to repeat in years to come. I love the country, love the people and love the detecting.

 I look forward seeing our finds displayed in Vinkovci museum.