1. Billion Dollar Hindu Treasure



In June 2011, a most spectacular treasure consisting of billions in gold and jewels was found in six underground chambers of the Sree Padmanabhaswamy Temple, located in Kerala province in southern India.
 
The treasure, worth an estimated 500 billion rupees (around £7bn), established the temple as one of India's richest. Among the objects found were gold necklaces weighing 5.5 pounds, a golden bow, a golden rope, bangles, antique silvers, one ton of gold in the shape of rice trinkets, sacks full of diamonds, thousands of pieces of antique jewelry studded with diamonds and emeralds, 37 pounds of gold coins from the East India Company, 18 Napoleonic coins, precious stones wrapped in silk bundles, and sovereigns bearing a seal from 1772.
 
Sree Padmanabhaswamy was built in the 16th century by the kings of the Kingdom of Travancore to serve as a royal chapel for the rulers of Travancore. In June 2011, the Supreme Court directed the authorities from the archaeology department and fire services to open the secret chambers of the temple for inspection of the items kept inside.
 
Prior to the discovery, the richest temple in India was thought to be the Thirupathy temple in the southern Andhra Pradesh state, which contains valuables worth 320 billion rupees.

3. Hoxne Hoard



On November 16, 1992, a hoard of late Roman silver and gold was discovered by a metal detectorist in the village of Hoxne in Suffolk, England.
 
The hoard was discovered in a farmer's field, about 2.4 kilometres southwest of the village. Peter Whatling, the tenant farmer, had lost a hammer and asked his friend Eric Lawes, a retired gardener and amateur metal detectorist, to help him look for it. While searching the field with his metal detector, Lawes discovered silver spoons, gold jewelry, and numerous gold and silver coins. After retrieving a few items, he and Whatling notified the landowners and the police, without attempting to dig out any more objects.
 
The next day, a team of archaeologists from the Suffolk Archaeological Unit carried out an emergency excavation of the site. The entire hoard was excavated in a single day, with the exception of numerous large blocks of unbroken material left for laboratory excavation.
 
The treasure was buried in a small chest filled with items made of precious metals, sorted mostly by type, with some in smaller wooden boxes and others in bags or wrapped in fabric. The coins of the hoard date it after AD 407, which coincides with the end of Britain as a Roman province. The owners and their reasons for burying the treasure are unknown, but it was carefully packed and the contents appear consistent with what one very wealthy family might have owned.
 
The hoard consists of 14,865 Roman gold, silver, and bronze coins from the late fourth and early fifth centuries, and approximately 200 items of silver tableware and gold jewelry.
 
The objects are now in the British Museum in London, where the most significant pieces and a selection of the rest are on permanent display. In 1993, the Treasure Valuation Committee valued the hoard at £1.75 million (today £3.02 million).

5. Staffordshire Hoard



On July 5, 2009, Terry Herbert came across a hoard with his 14-year-old metal detector as he searched a field near his home in Staffordshire, England.
 
The treasure, believed to date back to the Seventh Century, contains around 5 kg of Gold and 2.5 kg of silver, far bigger than previous finds. Many of the items in the hoard are warfare paraphernalia, including sword pommel caps and hilt plates, often inlaid with precious stones. Experts said that the collection of more than 1,500 pieces, tentatively dated to the 7th or 8th centuries, may have belonged to Saxon royalty of Mercia.
 
Mr. Herbert, who has been metal detecting for 18 years, came across the buried hoard after asking a farmer friend if he could search on his land. He said, ''I have this phrase that I say sometimes, 'spirits of yesteryear take me where the coins appear,' but on that day I changed coins to gold... I don't know why I said it that day, but I think somebody was listening and directed me to it... Maybe it was meant to be, maybe the gold had my name on it all along, I don't know."
 
The treasure was valued at £3.285 million and has now been purchased by the Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery and the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery.