A gold ingot found near Preston Capes, Northamptonshire. (c) Portable Antiquities Scheme, CC BY-SA 4.0
Description
Gold Ingot (BH-720251)
A gold ingot found near Preston Capes, Northamptonshire
The Vikings arriving in England had a bullion economy in which they paid for goods, most commonly, with silver that was weighed to an amount agreed between the buyer and the seller. Though rarer than silver equivalents, this gold ingot formed part of the bullion currency used by Vikings in England. It took some time for the Scandinavian settlers to adopt a monetary economy like that of the Anglo-Saxons, and both systems were used simultaneously for a while before they fully adopted the new system. The Vikings were familiar with monetary economies but they treated coins as just another form of bullion before adoption of a monetary economy.
