A light on the past

As I drove to work this morning news was breaking of the anglo-saxon treasure found in a field in Staffordshire.

Normally when these are announced people refer to the treasure found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk where 1.5 kg of Gold Artifacts was found in 1939 to give the recent find a sense of perspective.

However this find is much larger with 5kg of Gold and 2.5 kg of Silver and dwarfs Sutton Hoo, as you can imagine archaeologist are getting a tadge excited.

The find, believed to date to the 7th century ad (for you North Americans about 800 years before Columbus and 1,100 before a bunch of Colonists got huffy about a justifiable tax on tea to pay for a war fought on behalf of some ungrateful colonists - smirk) is expected to further challenge our perceptions of a period of history called the dark ages.

From when the Romans left Britain (about 410 ad I believe) to around the 9th century there is a great hole in our knowledge. The Saxons who came in tended to build out of wood and they used leather and hide for their cups, therefore it often assumed that the dark ages was an uncivilized time. Discoveries like those at Staffordshire and Sutton Hoo throws a light on the past and shows the great craftsmanship around at the time.