What's new
By:

Where did the gold go?

To get around the liability - Melt the treasure down, pour the liquid into cold water. It will breat up into nuggets. Nuggets are legal to sell. AND they sell for more than their gold content. You can even add other metals.
Goldfinder
 

Sorry, I just started reading this thread. Need some examples of bad archeology or how the government screws guys trying to do the right thing? Read : Treasure Hunter, Diving For Gold on America's Death Coast by Robert MacKinnon. A great read. Will make anyone think twice before trying to work with government officials...
 

I reviewed that book and worked for Bob on some wrecks there. The laws were changed through the actions of a couple of people and now hundreds of great sites will only be touched by looters. What a shame.
 

This type of behavior is typical of many government officials in the US as well as Canada. This has been well chronicled by author Gary Gentile in his many battles with various government agencies in attempting to gain access to shipwrecks. If you are not familiar with him, his books are a great read. He is not a treasure hunter, although he is an avid wreck diver.
 

Are you going to look for NSR in T? lol

Também lá ia ;)

Alexandre said:
According to Portuguese legislation, our country cannot engage in treasure hunting. Also, being a State Party to the Unesco Convention, the county has to enforce it.

As for gold found in an archaeological site, it would be treated in the same way as a piece of pottery or a shard of ceramic: it cannot be auctioned, sold or traded.~

In my opinion, there is a value that one can attach to a cannon or a silver ingot. That value will add to the National Treasure.

Anyhow, if I find my target in the next years (one that was lost with c. 22 tons of silver and gold) I will give you a more pratical answer, since I will have to deal with the issue. ;)
Click to expand...
 

I know where is!

Gold is in the bottom of the sea, but the lobby of yellow metal, using the dogmatic archaeologists and saved for tomorrow. The play is perfect: we use them for our future advantage (gold goes up every year). Cheers VV
:laughing7: :hello2::headbang:
 

ScubaFinder said:
OK, I'll play along for a minute.

First off, I consider myself an ethical, private archaeologist (stolen from Doug Pope and Amelia Research). I'm actually a lot more like Jacques Cousteau than Mel Fisher. I could care less about hundreds of millions of dollars....sure it would be nice, but its not why I'm doing this. If I wanted money, I would have stayed with my 6 figure career. I left that to hunt for shipwrecks for $10 an hour....so calling me greedy won't get you far.

Of course I like peer recognition, and I have a lot of great friends on both sides of the fence. But again, not why I am here. My peers recognize me for many of my accomplishments, and a few of my pitfalls as well. :-) I'm not perfect, but I accept my mistakes with the same diligence as my successes.

I enjoy hours on end hunched over an electrolytic reduction bath watching artifacts loose their encrustation. I spend my own money conserving my mortar cannon in the Dominican Republic (only 3 more months to go). When it's done, I will donate it to the Museo de Atarazanaz in Santo Domingo. I logged almost 300 hours of underwater time on the San Miguel de Archangel last year alone. So all the cliche' things archaeologists say about treasure hunters, they do not apply to me. You'd be hard pressed to find ANY archaeologist who conserved more artifacts, or spent more time in the water than I did last year. Scott (seahunter) did even more, and finance the whole Archangel excavation out of his own pocket.

What I'm really after is the hunt, the journey. Solving the mystery of where a ship went down, or finding one blindly and solving which ship it is. I'm doing that right now in my home town...an old ballast pile was discovered in the 50's but never investigated. It's not a treasure wreck, but I'm out there diving it frequently just trying to deduce what year and nationality it might be, looking for any clue that might help me ID it. Why would I spend all this time and money if I know its not a treasure wreck....because Its in my blood, I have to know...it may be historically important.

For me, its solving the countless mysteries, its the hunt, the countless hours of study, and of course....the eureka moment. That is what I live for.
Click to expand...

OK, here's the solution to the problem:

Jason becomes the cornerstone of the Reformed Science (not art) of Archaeology. The hierarchy of archaeological academia becomes reinvigorated, the unemployment rate goes up slightly when the current worldwide staff of PhDs gets laid off (you can't have it all your own way), and all of a sudden Marine Archaeology takes off like a rocket.
`
Jason is back on a six figure salary, but actually does something for it. He also gets to do the things he likes, so it works for him.

Aquanut goes back on salary as a consultant, Ivan gets paid to research, and so on.
 

Oceanscience said:
By the year 1500, there was about 50 tons of gold in European hands.
Then came the plunder of the Americas.
This added another 150 tons of gold.
By the year 1700 there was about 200 tons of gold in European hands.

Then the gold from Brazil started coming.

The Brazilian gold production was massive. During the next 130 years, about 1800 tons of the gold shipped, arrived in Portugal.

How many ships sank with large amounts of gold on board?

But what happened to the gold after it arrived in Portugal?

A very large part was shipped again, from Portugal to France and specially to England.

How much of that gold ended up on the bottom of the ocean?
Click to expand...
Old thread, fascinating opening although not so interesting remainder of the thread with bickering about what archaeologists want.

If I may, why was there such a massive transfer of gold (~900 tons) from Portugal to Britain? Payment of debts and/or for the purchase of certain goods?

The trade routes from New Spain back to Spain and to Manilla is very well documented and discussed here on TNet. Brazil's gold back to Portugal and its colonies is not so well documented and discussed for some reason. I imagine the Jesuits were also involved in Brazil, usually clandestinely moving bullion from Brazil back to the Vatican.

I would be very grateful if someone could point me to resources where I can research more about Brazil's gold production, routes, & transport of gold to Portugal and its colonies.

I started researching about treasure on TNet about a year ago, mainly studying the history of what is now the U.S. Southwest but have recently started digging into shipwrecks, the history, trade routes, movement of bullion & gems.

All very fascinating and addictive. Some days I spend 16 hours on TNet reading. I am single in my 40s and retired so I have all the time in the world to dedicate to research and hopefully at some point the adventure and journey of the search for a wreck and/or something on land.
 

Tanneyhill said:
If I may, why was there such a massive transfer of gold (~900 tons) from Portugal to Britain? Payment of debts and/or for the purchase of certain goods?
Click to expand...
Yes. Debts and purchasing goods tends to suck up your gold pretty fast.

Tanneyhill said:
I imagine the Jesuits were also involved in Brazil, usually clandestinely moving bullion from Brazil back to the Vatican.
Click to expand...
The Vatican may have indirectly ended up with the gold, but it would have come from the government and highfalutins who also got to wet their beaks. But for the most part, Europeans in the New World were there in service of the monarchy. Therefore, everything collected, loaded and shipped back to Europe was the property of the king. This would have been the case until general trade was established with colonies, and even then the "freest" economic system was mercantilism. That meant that you had to secure permission from the government to engage in trade, but you had a significant amount of control over how you did it, provided you paid all the fees, taxes, bribes, payoffs, etc.
 

Tanneyhill said:
Old thread, fascinating opening although not so interesting remainder of the thread with bickering about what archaeologists want.

If I may, why was there such a massive transfer of gold (~900 tons) from Portugal to Britain? Payment of debts and/or for the purchase of certain goods?

The trade routes from New Spain back to Spain and to Manilla is very well documented and discussed here on TNet. Brazil's gold back to Portugal and its colonies is not so well documented and discussed for some reason. I imagine the Jesuits were also involved in Brazil, usually clandestinely moving bullion from Brazil back to the Vatican.

I would be very grateful if someone could point me to resources where I can research more about Brazil's gold production, routes, & transport of gold to Portugal and its colonies.

I started researching about treasure on TNet about a year ago, mainly studying the history of what is now the U.S. Southwest but have recently started digging into shipwrecks, the history, trade routes, movement of bullion & gems.

All very fascinating and addictive. Some days I spend 16 hours on TNet reading. I am single in my 40s and retired so I have all the time in the world to dedicate to research and hopefully at some point the adventure and journey of the search for a wreck and/or something on land.
Click to expand...
A good source in the English language about the gold from Brazil is the historian C.R Boxer. He wrote many books.
You could start reading "The Portuguese Seaborn Empire"
 

Tanneyhill said:
This is great. Thank you for sharing both of these books. I appreciate it.

I am going to dive into C.R Boxer's book first followed by that of Charles Ralph Boxer. Ya'll will hear from me with further questions I am sure as I go. 🙂
Click to expand...
The attached file should get you started. There are a few sources mentioned.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Lord Nelsons sword story

⬅️ Previous Thread

1 hour Spanish TV special on treasure hunting

Next Thread ➡️

Top Member Reactions

Similar threads

Crow
The Gold of the RMS Douro
Replies
3
Views
1K
Crow
Crow
: Michael-Robert.
The Merchant Royal was in port in Cadiz when it learned of a Spanish ship that was overburdened with this treasure.
7 8 9
Replies
162
Views
20K
unamedforsafety
U
dognose
Hundreds Died When This Steamship Sank in the Pacific Northwest in 1875 With Gold Worth Millions On Board
Replies
8
Views
421
Gare
Gare

Users who are viewing this thread

Total: 1 (members: 0, guests: 1)
We Dig Metal Detectors

Latest Discussions

Back
Top Bottom