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Kevan Halls (55 - 58) is an amateur Archaeologist who has been using a
metal detector for some 25 years and usually went on outings to farms in the
Winchester area at weekends only. In 1997 he decided to retire from his main job
which was Sales Manager to Allied Flour Mills, thus giving him more time to
devote to his metal detecting hobby. He and his wife also own a flower shop.
In the year 2000, Kevan 'stumbled' upon the greatest find of his life, a gold broach and fastening chain which was originally thought to be Roman but on later research turned out to be Celtic. Over the next three months, in conditions of great secrecy and in co-operation with local Archaeologists, he discovered further items and the treasure became known as the Winchester Gold Jewellery Hoard containing what appear to be two sets of personal jewellery, each unique and made from over a kilogram of gold. Archaeologists at the British Museum have described this as 'a very important find'.
The Coroner and Winchester Courts have declared the find as treasure
belonging to the Crown and it has been valued by a board of Valuers in Ancient
Artefacts, finally ending up on display in the Prehistoric Rooms of the British
Museum. Kevan and his Winchester Hoard were also featured in September 2003 on
the BBC2 series of programmes entitled 'Hidden Treasures' and he has been
writing a book on his years of metal-detecting leading up to the great find.
The following is reproduced from a British Museum News Release dated March 2001:-
Unique Prehistoric gold jewellery found near Winchester
One of the most important Prehistoric finds of the last 10 years, a group of unique Iron Age gold jewellery, has recently been made by a metal detectorist in the Winchester area of Hampshire. Probably made between 60 and 20 BC, the hoard comprises two gold necklaces, four brooches and two bracelets. The find sheds new light on the changing nature of Britain in the years before the Roman Conquest and is the most important of its kind since the discovery of the Snettisham Hoards in 1991. The find also exemplifies the growing co-operation between metal detectorists and archaeologists resultant from the Portable Antiquities Scheme, a project set up in 1997 to encourage amateur finders to report archaeological finds. Dr J D Hill of the British Museum comments: "Sally Worrell of the Portable Antiquities Scheme in Hampshire was crucial to the reporting of this find, as she was the one who gained the trust of the finder. As a result, we know exactly where the find came from, which meant we were able to excavate the area and establish the context of the find. This has been a rare opportunity in the past."
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The objects appear to be two sets of personal jewellery made from over a kilogram of gold. The most spectacular and unusual objects are the two unique necklace/torcs. Torcs - neck rings - were an important status symbol in Iron Age Britain. Gold and silver torcs have been found in the West Midlands and in Norfolk and Suffolk, but no other torc from Britain or Europe is made in this distinctive way. The Winchester torcs were made using interlinked gold wire rings. This technique was used in the Roman and Greek worlds at this time, and was just spreading into northern Europe. It was and still is used to make fine jewellery chains. However, no Roman or Greek gold chains were ever made of gold wire this thick. The Winchester torcs were probably made by British craftspeople who took a new foreign technology to make a traditional status symbol in a obviously new way. The other finds include two matching pairs of gold brooches. Both were originally joined by a short gold chain. Most brooches at this time were made from iron or bronze. Silver and gold brooches are very rare in Britain or in other parts of Iron Age Europe.
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