Metal Detecting Silver Hammered Coins In Pskov Region, Russia
As an old saying goes, "The appetite comes with eating." Pavel and Andrei wanted me to find more old artifacts! The last available spot for searching was a section of dirt road that went through the site.
First ten signals turned out to be just the usual modern junk. My friends' enthusiastic mood was about to change when I received a signal that I was looking for, high-pitch tone, soft and solid.
When I dug up a silver coin, my friends almost had a heart attack! They had never seen an early Russian hammered coin in person. While they were examining it, I received another silver signal. A second hammered coin appeared in the dirt! Now everybody went crazy. Too bad the coins were too worn down to ID them, but they were from the 16th century for sure.
They Made Our Day!
I thought that I hit a "Hot" spot. But there were no more good signals around. I spent another hour searching the road outside the site perimeter to no avail. That was all we could do. We were happy anyway because we were leaving the place with a few cool trophies. When we came back to the village of Belokozovo, Pavel was a little upset about the scythe and kept telling us that his grandma would throw a fit about the damage. So we decided to drop our gear at the house first and then visit an old-timer who could repair the scythe.
Although he was an alcoholic, he could fix almost anything. We met the guy near his house. He was coming back from the bootlegger's place where he purchased a small bottle of Samogon - bootlegged yellowish booze, which had a strange odor and could be made from the saw dust.
He was happy to suddenly have a company. He poured us a shot. I knew that none of my friends could drink this Rocket Fuel. But we had to get the scythe fixed so I risked my health for the sake of good diplomacy.
Saveley, Local Jack Of All Trades, is Holding a Glass Of Local "Moonshine"
During our conversation, the guy told us about a mass grave of the WWII German soldiers. Many of them were buried after the fighting moved to another area. He pointed towards the hill with a pine grove situated on its top and suggested us to go metal detecting there.
We told him politely that we were neither the military relic diggers nor the gravediggers. After we explained to him that we were looking for old coins and artifacts, he told us about an old mansion that was located in different district. His niece lived there and found a few old coins while digging potatoes on her vegetable patch.
He told us that we could go there any time and she would be happy to have guests. He also said that he saw some ruins around that mansion. That was a good lead! We promised him that we would check it out and show him the finds. He promised that he would start fixing the scythe right away and bring it over in two hours!