The British Museum in London has unveiled a newly discovered hoard of Viking treasure that was hidden for more than 1,000 years.

The British Museum unveiled this gilt silver vessel dating back to the ninth century on Thursday. It was found stuffed with coins and artifacts abandoned by Vikings.
(Stefan Rousseau/Associated Press)

A father-son team of treasure hunters unearthed the trove of coins and jewelry in a farmer's field near Harrogate in northern England on Jan. 6.

Museum curators say the collection, shown in public for the first time Thursday, has 600 coins from as far away as Samarkand in central Asia, Afghanistan, Russia and North Africa.

"It's a fascinating find. It's the largest find of its type of over 150 years," said Gareth Williams, an expert at the British Museum who examined the items.
 
It is the largest such find in Britain since the 1840 discovery of the Cuerdale Hoard, a mass of 8,500 silver coins, chains and amulets, he said.

The cache was likely acquired through a combination of commerce and raids across Europe, Williams said.

The large range of origins of the booty shows the scope of Viking influence across Europe, he added.

Vikings fought as mercenaries in armies across Europe, into north Africa and crossed the steppes into Asia. In some regions, including Ireland, northern Britain and Normandy, they remained as farmers and colonizers, but this treasure reveals they continued as fearsome raiders.

The British Museum said it's likely the loot was hidden sometime after the fall of the Viking Kingdom of Northumbria in 927. Vikings often buried their wealth in times of trouble.

It was uncovered by David Whelan, 60, and his son Andrew, 35, who found it while trawling a field with a metal detector.

They began digging and found a silver bowl about 30 centimetres underneath the soil.

They could see coins and scraps of silver poking out, but did not disturb the cache, instead taking it intact to their local archeological finds officer.

Under British law, all such finds must be reported to authorities.

Their restraint helped preserve priceless clues as to how and when the hoard was hidden.

"We thought it was marvellous," David Whelan said. "But we didn't know for nearly a month what was in it."

The pair were on hand at the British Museum as curators tweezed the treasure out of the hard-packed earth that filled the bowl.

More than 600 coins and 65 other items, including a gold arm band, were found in and around the silver vessel.
(British Museum/Associated Press)

The treasure was crammed into a silver pot lined with gold and engraved with lions and deer, which once held the communion bread for a wealthy church in northern France. It may have been looted or offered in tribute to Viking rulers.

The pot also contained a gold arm ring possibly made in Ireland, silver rings and brooches, dress ornaments and coins.

Some of the coins mixed Christian and pagan imagery, indicating the Vikings had been newly Christianized, said Williams, a curator of early medieval coins.

The Whelans are thrilled with their find and say they plan to keep on treasure hunting.

"If we hadn't found it, we would've still been going," Whelan said. "We just keep going, we enjoy it."

The British Museum, which has an extensive collection of Viking artifacts found in the U.K., said it hopes to buy at least some of the hoard from the Whelan family once its value is determined.

With files from the Associated Press