Anglo-Saxon gold and silver found in the Staffordshire field

The gold and silver artefacts, which are already shedding new light on the Dark Ages, are collectively worth almost double the amount of the most expensive ancient treasure previously found in Britain.

Terry Herbert, 55, who lives alone in a council maisonette on disability benefits, stumbled across the hoard in July while searching a nondescript field owned by Fred Johnson near the M6 toll road between Lichfield and Tamworth. Herbert bought his first metal detector at a car boot sale for £2.50.

The two men, who had a minor falling out amid the publicity surrounding the record find, are now each expected to be paid a tax-free windfall of about £1.5m.

They include 84 sword caps, 71 hilt collars, helmets and parts of at least four crucifixes, with a folded gold cross singled out as one of the most valuable items in the hoard. Together, the artefacts contain more than 5kg (11lb) of gold — three times the amount found in 1939 at the Sutton Hoo burial site in Suffolk — and 2.5kg of silver.

The Staffordshire find easily surpasses the Hoxne collection of 15,000 Roman artefacts discovered by another metal detection enthusiast in Suffolk in 1992. It was worth £1.7m, the most valuable discovery until now.

This Wednesday the government’s treasure valuation committee will meet to consider the advice of a panel of independent experts. They include specialists from Christie’s and Bonhams auction houses, along with Charles Ede, the antiquities firm, and Peter Spencer, a leading metal detector. It is understood they all believe the Staffordshire hoard, dating from the 7th or 8th centuries, to be worth about £3m.

However, a final settlement may still take some time as Birmingham city museum and the Potteries museum in Stoke-on-Trent, which intend to display the Staffordshire hoard jointly, need to raise the money to buy the artefacts and pay Herbert and Johnson in accordance with the Treasure Act 1996.

The Department for Culture, Media and Sport will act as a final arbiter.

While £3m is a considerable sum for regional museums to raise, the exceptional nature of the artefacts means the money will almost certainly be found with the help of public funds, including lottery cash.

Johnson, 65, who may have brought the Anglo-Saxon hoard closer to the surface while ploughing his field, has said he will invest his windfall to fund his retirement. Herbert, a former worker at a coffin factory, has suggested he will buy a bungalow from his share of the proceeds.

No more metal detecting or excavation work has been carried out since the discovery in summer and the site has been cordoned off by police. The rest of Johnson’s grass field has now been given over to horses.

“It is quite possible that other finds from the same period might be in the vicinity,” said Roger Bland, head of portable antiquities and treasure at the British Museum, who has co-written a new book about the Staffordshire hoard.

He points out that there was a small Anglo-Saxon find in 2004 about a mile away from the latest site. Further excavation will almost certainly begin in the spring.

Leslie Webster, former keeper of the British Museum’s department of prehistory, believes the hoard is the “metalwork equivalent of a new Lindisfarne Gospels or the Book of Kells”.

The historical significance of the treasure — dating from between 675 and 725 — is considerable. It has led some experts to question whether Christianity may have been practised in the region earlier than previously thought.

Although some of the artefacts may amount to booty acquired from military campaigns, the location and reason for their burial remains a mystery.

Nicholas Brooks, emeritus professor of medieval history at the University of Birmingham, believes the hoard could represent a “royal treasury”.

He points out that AngloSaxon nobles paid a “heriot”, or tax, in the form of weapons or bullion to their king when they died. In return, the king would honour the vassal’s wishes about the disposal of his property.

Mercian kings from this period, such as Wulfhere and Aethelred, are likely to have had a supply of weapons which they could give to young warriors joining their service. “This hoard could represent such a stock of weapons,” said Brooks.

“There’s no comparable find of such gold or silver objects in either England or in Europe,” said Bland. “All previous notable discoveries have been grave burials like Sutton Hoo.”