The Galloway Hoard
Anyone who has enjoyed the award-winning program ‘Vikings’ (2013-2020) has undoubtedly wondered what happened to the objects buried for safekeeping throughout Scandinavia and across Great Britain and Ireland during ‘The Viking Age’ (793-1066). Theories concerning the purpose of Viking Age hoards include the belief that the burial sites substituted for banks. Individuals hid their wealth with the intention of later retrieval. Norse sagas contain examples of wealth buried in the ground to be accessed in the afterlife. Treasures might have been buried to seal an oath or to claim land. Many Viking Age hoards from Ireland have been discovered in or near churches. These finds have led researchers to question who owned them and buried them and the role of the Church in the economy of the Viking Age in Britain and Ireland.
Some individuals spend years trying to find a hoard, sometimes getting lucky and discovering artifacts that provide valuable information regarding life in medieval times. For instance, an amateur treasure hunter on the Isle of Man discovered a Viking Age hoard (some of which is shown below) that contains a 1,000-year-old analog to today’s Bitcoin.
The hoard found on the Isle of Man contained 87 silver coins, 13 pieces of silver arm-rings and several artifacts. Examples are shown above. (Image credit: Manx National Heritage) Source: LiveScience
In 2014, an amateur metal detectorist went looking for treasure and found a number of silver artifacts buried in a shallow pit on Church of Scotland land. He notified authorities and an archaeological team began to work the site. The hoard discovered, now known as ‘The Galloway Hoard’ is the richest, most diverse, and most curious collection of Viking Age artifacts unearthed in the British Isles. The Galloway Hoard was saved for the nation by the National Museums Scotland in 2017 after a major fundraising campaign. Since then, curators and conservators have been working to clean, preserve, and understand the Hoard. The results to date are shown in a new exhibition, Galloway Hoard: Viking-age Treasure, currently on display in Edinburgh.
Within the Galloway Hoard is the largest collection of Viking Age gold surviving from Britain and Ireland. All of the gold objects are unusual and distinct from one another, coming from distant places and different manufacturing traditions.
Shown above are some of the contents of the Galloway Hoard, before conservation.
Source: Understanding the Hoards in the Viking Age
In addition to gold objects, quantities of silver were found as well. Silver was a crucial element of the Viking Age economy, functioning as a form of currency and a measure of wealth.
 | Twenty-two pieces of silver bullion, including both raw ingots and flattened Viking arm rings, were discovered in the Galloway Hoard. The most common objects in the hoard are silver Hiberno-Scandinavian broad-band arm-rings. Although the arm-rings cannot be dated directly, other hoards containing similar arm-rings also contained coins dating to AD 880-930. This suggests that the Galloway Hoard is Scotland’s earliest Viking Age hoard. [Source of photo at left and narrative: Archaeology Magazine] |
| Silver arm rings recovered from the Galloway Hoard were made by hammering out carefully measured portions of ingots. Many of the rings in the hoard have never been shaped to be worn, even though they were decorated. Most are flattened and folded, intended as bullion and valued for their weight, like the ingots found with them. Some have been hacked into portions, already used as bullion and ready to be recycled again. Arm rings that were found could be divided into four types and were inscribed using Anglo-Saxon runes (ancient letters). A cluster of four decorated Viking arm rings (at left), bound together by a smaller fifth ring, was found buried in the lower deposit of the Hoard. Source: Archaeology Magazine |  |
 | In the Galloway Hoard, an ornate silver cross (shown at left) was found with a spiral silver chain wrapped around it. The cross was decorated with Anglo-Saxon zoomorphic and geometric designs popular in the kingdoms of southern Briton in the ninth century A.D. The cross is decorated in Late Anglo-Saxon style using black niello and gold-leaf. In each of the four arms of the cross are the symbols of the four evangelists who wrote the Gospels of the New Testament, Saint Matthew, Mark (Lion), Luke (Cow), and John (Eagle). |
Also recovered from the Galloway Hoard was an engraved four-inch-tall, lidded silver vessel (pictured below) which was carefully wrapped in several layers of fabric that remained partially preserved and attached. Textiles wrapped around the vase depict Zoroastrian fire altars, winged crowns, and animals such as leopards and tigers, all common motifs associated with the Sasanian Empire, the ruling empire of modern-day Iran from 224 to 651 A.D. When researchers opened the vessel’s lid, they found it was packed with an assortment of tiny treasures. that seem to have been collected over hundreds of years and across thousands of miles.
Source: Archaeology
 | A collection of glass beads, pendants, and curios were placed inside the Hoard’s lidded silver vessel. (shown above) Source: Archaeology Magazine |
Other artifacts are also wrapped in textiles. One was a two-inch tall jar (appearing below) made of rock crystal and gold whose features indicate that it was manufactured in the Roman Empire. The silk in which it was wrapped is thought to have originated in a market along the Eurasian Silk Road.
The jar made of rock crystal and gold contained a small amount of precious liquid that could be poured out through a spout on its top. A Latin inscription on the vessel’s bottom states that a bishop named Hyguald was responsible for its creation. Source: Archaeology
 Source: Understanding the Hoards in the Viking Age |  Source: Archaeology |
To try to make sense of the Galloway Hoard, researchers regarded Galloway’s unique location at that time. It was situated between two Viking kingdoms, one based in Dublin and controlling the Irish Sea and the Scottish west coast, and a group controlling much of northern, central, and eastern Britain. This second territory was known as the Danelaw and its capital was Jorvik or what is now York. Galloway was part of Anglo-Saxon Northumbria but was cut off from other Anglos-Saxon and surrounded by Vikings. The Galloway Hoard reflects this mix of cultures.
When we think of ‘Viking Age’ objects we often imagine swords, shields, ships, and other warlike expressions of material culture. The delicate sophistication of many of the objects in the Galloway Hoard challenges us to see the people of the past as complex individuals just as concerned with aesthetics, amusement, and creativity as many are today. It indicates that the Vikings were not of a single geographical origin or ethnicity. They integrated very quickly into the politics and society of Britain and Ireland, quickly adopting new languages, habits, and customs while also retaining the old. Galloway seems to have stood between the old and new longer than most parts of Scotland. The Galloway Hoard reflects the mix of world views and cultures existing there during the Viking Age.
We will undoubtedly hear more about The Galloway Hoard in the future as the project continues, enabling more detailed analysis and understanding of this complex hoard, including scientific dating of some materials and, it is hoped, the identification of some places of origin.
