Starting My Treasure Hunting In England

After getting Liang En's permission, Fan Meng quickly cleared away the old newspapers. Then pieces of gray-black metal ingots glowing with metallic light were revealed inside. "Oh - this seems to be silver."

After gently picking up the two pieces and touching them, Fan Meng showed an excited expression on his face. As a result, when he turned around, he found Liang En holding a piece of silver and frowning.

At this time, Liang En had already measured the size of this thing with the small tape measure he carried with him, and found that each silver ingot was basically 6cm long and 3.5cm wide. It is 1.5cm thick and has many scratches and black oxidation marks on it.

"Boss, this is money." Looking at Liang En's expression, Fan Meng showed a puzzled expression. "And I think these things must be old antiques."

In Fan Meng's opinion, this aged precious metal ingot should fully meet the definition of treasure, so he couldn't understand why Liang En was not excited at all.

Liang En was speechless looking at the excited Fan Meng, but since he was his assistant, he had to explain at this time to prevent Fan Meng from falling into trouble one day.

"This thing is called archway ingot, also known as assessed silver and saddle ingot. It is named because its shape resembles the ancient archway building. It was cast during the Guangxu and Xuantong years of the Qing Dynasty and lasted for more than thirty years until it was withdrawn from circulation in the early Republic of China. Circulated in the southwestern region of China."

"Due to the implementation of the "Abolition of Two and Reform of Yuan" in the early years of the Republic of China, a large part of this silver was recycled and recast into silver dollars, and not much remains today."

After hearing what Liang En said, Fan Meng became even more confused. Because according to Liang En, this type of silver ingot, known as the archway ingot, has a short release time, a small scope, and a small remaining quantity. Then it should be more valuable.

"I remember you know Chinese, so you can take a look at what the words are written on it." Seeing Fan Meng's confused look, Liang En smiled, then pointed to the words on one of the pieces of silver and said.

Although Fan Meng looks like a combination of Chinese and Western, he was forced by his father to learn Chinese since he was a child. Therefore, he still recognized the stamps on these silver bars, so he quickly read out the Chinese characters on the silver bars.

"Guang Bao Tong Xu Tian Bao Di Bao" After recognizing those messy Chinese characters, Fan Meng also frowned. Because not only does the content of these words make no sense at all, but the structure of the words is also very bad, just like a child's graffiti.

"Because these are not silver coins minted in China at all, but imitations from Southeast Asian countries." Liang En directly revealed the answer. It turns out that although the southwest border of China was remote, it had prosperous international trade.

In the border trade between local merchants and neighboring countries such as Thailand, Myanmar, and Laos, the circulation rate of silver dollars is not high, and a large amount of silver is still needed as hard currency in trade.

Therefore, those silver ingots from various provinces in China, including the archway ingots, that had been withdrawn from circulation, were transformed into international trade currencies, and were even finally regarded as a kind of local legal currency.

In this way, in addition to obtaining a large amount of silver ingots through trade, those Southeast Asian countries will also cast a batch of silver ingots according to the style and shape of traditional Chinese silver ingots to meet international trade and local circulation.

However, due to the differences in language, culture and technical conditions between countries, the silver ingots cast cannot compare with those of China in terms of craftsmanship or writing level. The casting quality is rough, the quality is chaotic, and the inscriptions are full of errors.

For example, Liang En and the others have now found that the inscription "Guangbao Tongxu" on these silver ingots is a misspelling of "Guangxu Tongbao". They should refer to the copper coin inscriptions but do not understand the order of ring reading.

As for the Tianbao Dibao at the back, it comes from traditional Chinese folk money used to pray for blessings and ward off disasters. It is probably printed here to allow these silver ingots to obtain the blessing and supervision of the gods.

"In other words, these silver coins are just poor imitations of genuine silver ingots?" Fan Meng shrugged helplessly after hearing what Liang En said. He thought he would find the treasure the first time he worked, but now it seems that is not the case.

"Yes, because the quality of these silvers is obviously not as good as genuine silver ingots, and the output and stock are also very large." Liang En nodded. "So the price of these silver ingots in the market is equivalent to their equivalent weight of silver."

"Each of these silver ingots is five taels of silver from China in the past, which is equivalent to about 170 grams today. If placed on the market, each piece should be sold for about 100 pounds."

"That's not a small number." Fan Meng had already adjusted his emotions at this time. "After all, even in a place like London, the per capita monthly income is only over 3,300 pounds, so 600 pounds should be higher than most people's weekly salary."

As for the reason why these silver ingots were hidden on the door frame, Liang En also found out from the newspapers wrapping these silver ingots. The dates on these newspapers were all between May and August 1940.

That time period coincided with the disastrous defeat of the British Expeditionary Force on the European continent in the early stages of World War II. Although it retained its effective strength through the Dunkirk evacuation, its weapons were almost exhausted. At the same time, the German Air Force began bombing various British cities.

For the British people, the entire country is in chaos at this time, and war may ignite in Britain at any time. Therefore, many British people chose to exchange for some precious metals and hide them in order to survive that chaotic time.

This silver should have been hidden by the people who lived here at that time. As for why it is Southeast Asian silver ingots, it is normal. After all, Britain was an empire on which the sun never sets, and it looted all over the world, so it is normal for silver from other countries to appear.

After putting away the silver, Liang En and the others began to search other places, but unfortunately, except for the oak coffee table and silver ingots, they did not find anything valuable on the first floor.

And when the two people climbed to the second floor, they discovered that compared to the first floor, the things on the second floor were obviously inferior to the first floor in terms of value.

The reason for this situation is that compared to the public space on the first floor, the private space on the second floor will change the contents every time the owner of the room changes, so there is not much valuable left at all. thing.

Although the things placed on the second floor are much better preserved than those on the first floor because the glass on the windows on the second floor is intact, these things from the 1960s and 1970s are really uninspiring.

To take the simplest example, there is an old-fashioned TV with a large picture tube placed in the bedroom and guest room on the second floor. It seems to be forty or fifty years old. But it can only be regarded as electronic waste.

But when the two men climbed to the attic, the situation changed again. In addition to a large pile of rags deep in the attic, they found a box about the same size as a car trunk.

"This is a camphor wood box from Southeast Asia." After wiping off the dust on the box and looking at the patterns on it, and then getting closer and smelling it, Liang En looked at the surrounding area in front of him, which was hooped with several rings of reinforcing iron. said the big box.

"Such a large camphor wood box can be sold for at least more than a hundred pounds. More importantly, this type of box is often used to store some important items. If there is something inside, we will really make a profit this time."

After speaking, Liang En used the ax in his hand to smash open the big rusty lock on the box, and then opened the lid.