Amateur British metal detectorist discovery of gold pendant belonging to the first of Henry’s six wives is the the most significant find in quarter of a century.
Charlie Clarke was a novice. The 34-year-old cafe owner in Birmingham, England, had been metal detecting for only six months when, in 2019, he dug up a 500-year-old gold pendant in Warwickshire, in England’s West Midlands region.
The pendant featured the symbols of King Henry VIII and his first wife Katherine of Aragon, on a chain composed of 75 links, attached by an enameled suspension link in the form of a hand. The first of Henry VIII’s six wives, Katherine married Henry in 1509.
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Weighing 300 grams (10.6 ounces), the pendant is heart-shaped. One side is decorated with a Tudor rose entwined with a pomegranate bush growing from the same branch. The reverse shows the letters H and K – for Henry and Katherine – linked together. Both sides are inscribed with writing TOVS + IORS underneath, a pun on the French word “toujours” meaning “always.”
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By law, those who find treasure in Britain are required to report their finds, allowing museums the chance to acquire them, paying a fee that is split evenly between the finder and the landowner. After finding the pendant, Clarke first brought it to an expert in Birmingham, who he recalled was “shaking when she held it, her jaw was on the floor.”
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Researchers have confirmed the pendant’s authenticity, placing it at about 500 years old. The pendant, experts say, is the the most significant find in the twenty-five years since the government began recording British treasure finds, and there hasn’t been anything comparable dating from the Renaissance era found in the past 100 years.
“This object has just come out of the ground almost as if it dropped out of the sky,” said Rachel King, curator of Renaissance Europe for the British Museum where the pendant is now housed. “We’ve got an opportunity to study an object that hasn’t been subject to all of these sorting processes that people have historically taken …. we’re getting something that is in a sense raw information.”
There have been more than 45,500 archaeological finds – including more than 1,000 treasure cases – record in Britain in 2021, 96% of which had been found by people metal-detecting.
The pendant will eventually be sold, likely for a substantial amount. The money will be split between Clarke and the landowner, a friend of Clarke’s.
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