| The discovery of treasure always
creates excitement, none more so than when it is the subject of
mystery and legend, as when Howard Carter opened Tut-Ankh-Amen's
tomb in 1922 - you may recall Lord Carnarvon, Carter's associate,
died in mysterious circumstances in Egypt a few month's later, a
victim of the Pharoah's curse, they say. Howard Carter is pictured
opening the boy king's solid gold coffin on the first card in
Churchman's series of 12 large size Treasure Trove cards, a
fascinating series which illustrates and describes several historic
finds including silver-ware buried at Pompeii ever since Versuvius
erupted in A.D.79, the Stoke Prior hoard discovered in a
Herefordshire rabbit burrow by a man ferreting in 1891, the Iron Age
bronzes recovered from the bed of the River Thames when Battersea
and Waterloo Bridges were being built, and Sir Mortimer Wheeler's
discovery of Wonderful mosaics at Verulamium, the Roman city near St
Albans. We also learn that in 1928 Mussolini ordered the draining of
Lake Nemi near Naples so that two imperial Roman galleys belonging
to the Emperor Tiberius - floating palaces complete with marble
baths and swimming pools - could be reclaimed, whilst two of the
cards are given over to the then greatest ever feat of maritime
salvage, the recovery of tons of gold bullion from the wreck of the
P & O liner 'Egypt' lying on the floor of the Atlantic after a
collision in 1922. All are thrilling stories, with superb colour
illustrations.
This set of Churchman L12 Treasure
Trove 1935 in very good condition is catalogued at £18.00.
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