When classic car restorer and metal detecting enthusiast Kevin Duckett spotted a glint of gold peeking out beneath the soil of an English field in 2017, he initially thought he’d found a crumpled piece of foil. But as the Northamptonshire native continued digging, he soon realized he’d stumbled onto something far more valuable.
“The rush of adrenaline and the buzz of excitement started to flow through my body,” Duckett tells the Sun’s Paul Sims. “I was holding what appeared to be a heavy solid gold and enameled figurine.”
Standing just 2.5 inches tall, the statuette may have once formed the centerpiece of a dazzling Tudor crown. As historian Leanda de Lisle wrote on her website this past December, researchers had long thought that the diadem—worn by Henry VIII during processions marking the Feast of the Epiphany and by his five immediate successors during their respective coronations—was lost, its precious metals melted down to make coins and its jewels sold piecemeal following the fall of the British monarchy in 1649.
