Treasure (from Latin: thesaurus from Greek θησαυρός thēsauros, "treasure store") is a concentration of wealth — often originating from ancient history — that is considered lost and/or forgotten until rediscovered. Some jurisdictions legally define what constitutes treasure, such as in the British Treasure Act 1996.
The phrase "blood and treasure" has been used to refer to the human and monetary costs associated with massive endeavours such as war that expend both.
Treasure hunting is the physical search for treasure. One of the most popular types of modern day treasure hunters are historic shipwreck salvors. These underwater treasure salvors try to find sunken shipwrecks and retrieve artifacts with both commercial and archaeological value. In many instances, discovery of a wreck only occurs after searching tens of thousands of square nautical miles, thus making discovery normally impossible for archaeologists.
Since the popularization of metal detectors in the 1970s, treasure hunting has also taken the form of beach combing for lost valuables. Beach hunters may search for modern jewelry, pocket change, or shipwreck treasure. Most metal detectors will fall in the $150–$600 price range, but can even cost upwards of several thousand dollars. Metal detecting is generally quite tedious and most enthusiasts go years without finding an actually valuable object. Metal detectors are quite useful to archaeologists as well. On terrestrial sites they give researchers the ability to scan large swathes of land for important artifacts without having to consume time and resources excavating large holes. Skilled amateur archaeologists are also able to assist professionals by using their metal detectors to discover previously unknown sites. For example, in the United Kingdom, many discoveries have been made by metal detectorists that have had a large impact on the understanding of early British history.
A treasury is either
The head of a treasury is typically known as a treasurer. This position may not necessarily have the final control over the actions of the treasury, particularly if they are not an elected representative.
Built in murus dacicus style, the six Dacian Fortresses of the Orăștie Mountains (Romanian: Cetăți dacice din Munții Orăștiei), in Romania, were created in the 1st centuries BC and AD as protection against Roman conquest, and played an important role during the Roman–Dacian wars.
Their extensive and well-preserved remains present a picture of a vigorous and innovative ancient civilization. Today, treasure-hunters sometimes search the area, as Romania lacks legislation in this domain (see Archaeological looting in Romania).
Dowsing is a type of divination employed in attempts to locate ground water, buried metals or ores, gemstones, oil, claimed radiations (radiesthesia), gravesites, malign "earth vibrations" and many other objects and materials without the use of a scientific apparatus. It is also known as divining (especially in water divining), doodlebugging (particularly in the United States, in searching for petroleum or treasure) or water finding, or water witching (in the United States).
A Y-shaped twig or rod, or two L-shaped ones, called dowsing rods or divining rods are normally used, and the motion of these are said to reveal the location of the target material. The motion of such dowsing devices is generally attributed to random movement, or to the ideomotor phenomenon, a psychological response where a subject makes motions unconsciously.
The Varna Necropolis (Bulgarian: Варненски некропол), or Varna Cemetery, is a burial site in the western industrial zone of Varna (approximately half a kilometre from Lake Varna and 4 km from the city centre), internationally considered one of the key archaeological sites in world prehistory. The oldest gold treasure and jewelry in the world, dating from 4600 BC to 4200 BC, was discovered at the site. Several prehistoric Bulgarian finds are considered no less old – the golden treasures of Hotnitsa, Durankulak, artifacts from the Kurgan settlement of Yunatsite near Pazardzhik, the golden treasure Sakar, as well as beads and gold jewelry found in the Kurgan settlement of Provadia – Solnitsata (“salt pit”). However, Varna gold is most often called the oldest since this treasure is the largest and most diverse.
This is an incomplete list of notable treasures that are currently lost or missing. The existence of some of these treasures is mythical or disputed.
Smaug (/smaʊɡ/) is a dragon and the main antagonist in J. R. R. Tolkien's 1937 novel The Hobbit, his treasure and the mountain he lives in being the goal of the quest. Powerful and fearsome, he invaded the Dwarf kingdom of Erebor 171 years prior to the events described in the novel. A group of thirteen dwarves mounted a quest to take the kingdom back, aided by the wizard Gandalf and the hobbit Bilbo Baggins. In The Hobbit, Thorin describes Smaug as "a most specially greedy, strong and wicked worm".
Critics have identified close parallels with what they presume are sources of Tolkien's inspiration, including the dragon in Beowulf, who is provoked by the stealing of a precious cup, and the speaking dragon Fafnir, who proposes a betrayal to Sigurd. A further source may be Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 1855 poem The Song of Hiawatha, where Megissogwon, the spirit of wealth, is protected by an armoured shirt, but whose one weak spot is revealed by a talking bird. Commentators have noted Smaug's devious, vain, and proud character, and his aggressively polite way of speaking, like the British upper class.
The royal fifth (Spanish: quinto del rey), (Portuguese: quinto real) is a historical royal tax which reserves to the monarch 20% of all precious metals and other commodities (including slaves) acquired by his subjects as war loot, found as treasure or extracted by mining. The 'royal fifth' was first instituted in medieval Muslim states from interpretations of Qur'an, though the extent to which it applied was debated between schools of Islam. During the Age of Exploration, Christian Iberian kingdoms and their overseas colonial empires also instituted the tax, though to encourage exploration, some monarchs allowed colonists to keep some or all of the fifth.