May 9th. 2011.                                                                       

Next club meeting Monday 6th June 2011.

  • Annual General Meeting

Meetings are held at the Abbey Baptist Church, Abbey Square, commencing at 7.00 p.m.

 

NOTICES

 

Please can those of you who have not yet returned last month’s Census forms, please can you do so as soon as possible to ensure that we have correct and up-to-date information for you!

 

 

Skittles Evening

 

The annual skittles social, which took place on the 7th May, was a very enjoyable evening for the 18 members and guests who attended. 

 

The warm up game of boys versus girls, where the aim is to achieve the highest score, turned out to be a draw. A three way play off for those who achieved the individual highest scores eventually resulted in a win for Stacy.

 

The next game sounded very easy -just knock down at least one skittle. Not a problem until one realises that the skittles are only reset when all have been knocked down. Thus, as the game progresses for some there is very little to aim at resulting in rapid elimination. The eventual winner was? You've guessed it Stacy!

 

Following our hot buffet and coffee we started the final game which really sorts em out - knock down just one skittle. Easy ? not at all. Having failed to achieve a good score in the highest score game it is amazing how the skittles start flying when you aim to miss most of them. Once again elimination can be quite rapid, in some cases very rapid. Here Stacey's luck ran out and the eventual winner was guest Giles.

 

As usual, each of the winners received a bottle of wine. Many thanks to all who attended and contributed to such an enjoyable evening.  

 

 

May Meeting

 

For our May meeting, we had the pleasure of receiving the Chairman of Worthing and District Numismatic Society, Derek Aldred. Derek spoke about the Beachy Head Hoards of 3rd Century Roman Coins.

 

Derek began by explaining that in the region of 570 hoards of 3rd Century coins have been found in the UK, and 22 of those have been found in Sussex since 1855. Further to this, seven hoards have been found in one field on Beachy Head – a total of 17,328 coins!

 

Before Derek went into detail on the Beachy Head hoards, he commented that whilst over 17,000 sounds a lot, the largest hoard was found in Marlborough in the 1970’s – this was 54,951 coins! Yes, fifty-four thousand nine hundred and fifty-one!

 

Moving back to Beachy Head, Derek showed us a few pictures of the cliffs, and the field in which the hoards have been found - this was the site of a roman villa. The first hoard was recorded in 1879 and was found by two flint-diggers. Twenty years later, a second hoard of approximately 2000 coins was unearthed. The exact location of these finds is not recorded.

 

Into the 20th Century, and 1914 finds 550 coins recovered by Walter Marand – the first few of these having been dug up by rabbits! A bit of a gap to 1961 which saw a hoard of 5296 bronze coins found in a jar by plough! This was found by the land-owner, who also found another hoard in 1964 of 3173 silver coins, and co-found a third in 1973 of 5546 bronze – the other co-finder was none other than our speaker! These last three were all found within about 50ft of each other, and the 1973 hoard was one of the earliest in the UK to be found with a metal-detector.

 

We were then pleased to be shown some further pictures of the area, as well as some of the 1973 hoard in situ. Derek also passed around a clump of about 10 coins that had become stuck together during their 1700 year wait to be dug up – again, as found.

 

The 20 members in attendance all voiced their appreciation of the talk, and several questions and answers followed. Derek had also brought along a tray of some of the coins of the later three hoards, as well as other examples of coins from the period.

 

We thank Derek for coming to speak for us, and hope that he will return in a few years time – maybe with another hoard under his belt!

 

Future Events

  • Ancient, British and World Coins and Medals, Baldwins, London – 4th June
  • Coins and Collectables Fair, East Grinstead – 11th June
  • Cheltenham Coin Fair, Cheltenham – 12th June
  • Ancient, British and World Coins and Books, DNW, London – 21st June

 

 

Past Events

  • 1 years ago – “Pub Tokens and Games” – Bryce Neilson

·         10 years ago – “English Banknotes” – John Keyworth

·         40 years ago – “Roman Coins and their Relation to History” – Mr B.H. Grove

 

 

                                                                                                                        Club Secretary