Treasure hunters uncover link to last White Rose king

The copper-alloy mount was found on the Thames foreshore, near the Tower of London, and could have links to York and follows the discovery of a Viking-era hoard in Bedale.

It is included in the annual report by the The Portable Antiquities Scheme which aims to encourage the voluntary recording of archaeological objects found by members of the public in England and Wales.

The boar find was revealed as tests continue on a skeleton, found underneath a Leicester car park, to discover whether they were the remains Richard III.

Michael Lewis, of the British Museum’s department of Portable Antiquities and Treasure, said “The mount is very similar to a number of boar badges which have been reported treasure over the past few years, which were made for followers of Richard III (of York), as Duke of Gloucester, during the Wars of the Roses. Richard took the white boar as his sign. ‘Bore’ may have also been an anagram of Ebor, the Latin for York.”

An “extremely rare” Iron Age helmet used to hold human remains after a cremation, was also unearthed by a metal detectorist near Canterbury, Kent, last month.

It followed a hoard of Viking Age gold and silver metalwork being discovered in May, on farmland near Bedale. The hoard includes an iron sword pommel inlaid with gold foil plaques, four gold hoops from the hilt, four silver collars and neck-rings, a silver arm-ring, a silver brooch, and 29 silver ingots.

In this week’s Yorkshire Post Saturday magazine we meet the scientists who will decide whether the remains found in Leicester are really those of Richard III.