Treasure hunting and law: practice of the United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, the coroners locally represent the Crown law and act as the authoritative experts in legal precedents. The office of coroner was formally established in England in 1194. Nowadays, the function of coroners in recording the treasure and finds is regulated by the English Treasure Act of 1996. Noticeably, the Act of 1996 is legally operative only in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. There is separate law in Scotland. Both laws ascend to the Roman law, which defines treasure (thesaurus) as vetus quxdam depositio pecunix, cujus non extat memoria, ut jam dominum non habeat (an ancient deposit of money, of which no memory exists, so that it has no present owner). Under the emperors, if treasure was found on a person's own land or on sacred or religious land, the finder was entitled to keep it. However, if the treasure was found fortuitously, and not by deliberate search, on another person's land, half went to the finder and half to the owner of the land, who might be the emperor, the public treasury, or some other proprietor. The Act of 1996 states that all finds which are believed to be treasure must be reported to a coroner, who initiates enquiry in order to establish if the find is actually treasure. If so, the proprietary right is vested to the Crown. All treasure in fact belongs to the Crown. The Act of 1996 does not define the award to the finder or landowner, thus this matter is entirely at the discretion of the Crown. The British Museum has a legal responsibility under the terms of the 1996 Treasure Act to process treasure finds from England and Wales. If a find is declared treasure at inquest, both local and national museums have the opportunity to acquire it. The full market value of a find, as established by the independent Treasure Valuation Committee, is granted to the finders and landowners in the event of its acquisition by a museum. Only in the event of a find being declared 'not treasure', or where no museum expresses an interest in acquiring a find, will it be returned to the finder who could dispose it at his own convenience. In 2009 English Heritage presented a report which stated that from 1995 to 2008 more than 240 heritage sites, a third of which being in the state care, were attacked by treasure hunters, whilst the total number of attacks was much more. It was argued that only one of seven landowners attacked reported the illegal excavations.

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