Created: Monday, 24 February 2014 07:51

SPEYER, GERMANY—Germany’s state archaeology authority seized a trove of gold and silver artifacts estimated to be 1,500 years old from a treasure hunter who may have sold some of the pieces on the black market. The recovered items, perhaps buried by a Roman ruler fleeing the Germanic Teutons, include a solid silver bowl set, and a set of gold and silver-plated statuettes that were part of a military commander’s portable folding chair. The chair had been ‘brutally torn out of the earth and destroyed,” chief archaeologist Axel von Berg told The Local. Leaf-shaped gold brooches, thought to have decorated a Roman officer’s coat, were also found.