Treasure hoard discovered with over 1,500 silver coins from the 14th century

More than 1,500 silver coins from the early 1300s were discovered under a pipe trench in the village of Glottertal near Freiburg in 2024. The treasure hoard now sits under museum lights so visitors can study money that once changed hands across the Upper Rhine.

The coins are single sided, thin, and stamped with different designs that point to several mints. The stash anchors a moment when towns were busy, bishops wielded economic power, and silver moved along trade routes.

Why this treasure hoard matters

“Most of the pieces come from the mints of Breisach, Zofingen, and Freiburg,” said Andreas Haasis-Berner, an archaeologist with Baden-Württemberg’s State Office for Monument Preservation (RPS). The coins date to around the year 1320 and originate from mints in Freiburg, Zofingen, and Basel. 

Haasis-Berner led the first assessments and handled the recovery with regional heritage staff and certified field helpers. His team’s work set up the cataloging and conservation now underway at the museum.

The treasure hoard’s mix hints at a wide market rather than a closed local purse. Coins from multiple authorities suggest that shoppers and traders saw money from across river valleys and over nearby borders.

That spread lets researchers map how money flowed through the Breisgau in the decades before the Black Death. It also gives students a clear case of how coinage mirrored politics and trade.

Changing money system

Most of these pennies are bracteate, a thin, one-sided silver coin common in Central Europe. A 2020 paper explains how smiths struck bracteates so the front stood in relief and the back showed a shallow mirror image.

Bracteates are thin, one-sided medieval silver coins that were stamped with a design on only one face. The reverse side shows a hollow impression of the front image.

These coins were light and quick to make, which kept costs down. That suited fast growing towns that needed small change.

Mint masters did not keep coins around forever. Medieval rulers often ran renovatio monetae, a latin expression that means re-coinage, this is a periodic recall and reissue of coins with an exchange fee that functioned as a tax on trade.

An economic analysis shows how recoinage worked and why bracteates fit that policy.

This system nudged people to swap old types for new ones, which is why treasure hoards help date local money. When someone buried a purse and never returned, their loss became a time capsule.

How the find was recovered

A Glottertal resident noticed thin metal discs in the spoil while workers laid a pipe near a swimming pool. Heritage officials inspected the trench and authorized careful sifting of the spoil to rescue additional coins.

The team lifted hundreds more pieces using methodical checks rather than casual hunting. That approach preserved context, a key step when later analysis asks who buried the coins and why.

Officials cleaned the coins enough to read types and weigh them without rubbing away detail. Each entry in the inventory now records mint, an official place where coins are made, and basic measurements.

Careful handling matters when a thin coin can bend with little pressure. The less the surface is touched, the more safely legends, lines, and tool marks survive.

What the coins can teach

The stash captures how several money systems overlapped around the Upper Rhine. A single purse holding types from more than one authority shows that borders did not stop coins at town gates.

Researchers use hoards to test ideas about supply and silver sources. If several types cluster tightly in date, that pattern can flag a burst of minting after new ore entered the market.

The value of the stash helps translate medieval money into something more familiar. Experts say the hoard equaled about 150 sheep in the early 1300s.

Weights and sizes also matter. A larger diameter can mean thinner flans and different striking pressures on the die, the engraved tool used to stamp a design on a blank.

Reading the pennies

Motifs on the obverse range from crosses to bishops’ regalia to city emblems. Those designs point to a minting authority, the ruler or institution controlling coin production, which lets historians place power and policy alongside trade.

Lettering is sparse on many bracteates. That pushes analysts to compare style, silver content, and diameter to sort types. Some coins show slight bends or ripples. That follows from how they were struck with a single die against a softer backing like leather.

Even those quirks teach. Tiny differences in lines and borders can separate two issues and refine a timeline.

Lessons from treasure hoard coins

The Colombischlössle Archaeological Museum in Freiburg is exhibiting the hoard in a focused display. The museum offers expert tours, and tickets are available through the city’s online shop. 

Several programs feature the Glottertal hoard and explain what the coins reveal about medieval life. Visitors can learn how curators conserve thin coins without flattening them. Staff also show how catalog entries link a coin type to a mint and a time window.

Exhibits highlight the quiet role of silver mining in local valleys. They also connect money to everyday purchases that mattered to farmers, priests, and shopkeepers.

A treasure hoard this size likely belonged to someone with steady income and reasons to protect it. People hid money during unrest, while traveling, or before a major purchase.

Whether the owner died, moved, or simply forgot remains unknown. What is certain is that the loss preserved a clean snapshot of money in motion.

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