This week Katie sits down with Sam Willoughby, known on Instagram as the_peaky_larker, a Kent-based mudlarker, metal detectorist and self-described archaeo-detectorist who bridges both worlds with the kind of knowledge and ethics that makes you want to get outside immediately.
Sam shares how furlough in 2020 sent him to the banks of the Medway and eventually onto the Thames foreshore itself, where he waited 18 months for his Port of London Authority permit. He talks about upgrading from a Garrett ACE 150 to the Minelab Xterra Pro, why a 6-inch coil is non-negotiable on the foreshore, and how he became the only detectorist on an active Roman site in an elderly couple's back garden that has now yielded around 30 Roman coins.
There are finds too. A late Tudor buckle dug from a new permission while still recovering from a cold. A minuscule Hudson's Bay Company trade bead, red and black, manufactured in Britain and traded with indigenous peoples in North America for fur pelts. And one weird discovery that turned out to be a Victorian bedpan with a hospital crest, which Sam very wisely gave to a friend.
The conversation also covers the Dove's typeface mystery, the ethics of mudlarking on the foreshore, Thames Explorer Trust exhibitions, and a farmer near Richborough Roman Fort who took matters into his own hands with a bucket of copper nails.
Find Sam on Instagram at @peakylarker
Watch the full interview version of this episode from 6:30pm on YouTube at youtube.com/@detectinghistorychannel | Find Detecting History on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok and YouTube at @detectinghistorychannel | Use code DHPodcast at regton.com for 10% off some items.
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