6,500 medieval coins and rare gold rings unearthed in Poland

A medieval hoard brimming with silver ingots, gold rings and thousands of silver coins was recently discovered in a Polish cornfield by an archaeologist, with the help of a priest and local firefighters, Livescience.com reports. 

The nearly 900-year-old hoard, found in Słuszków, a village in west-central Poland, held a one-of-a-kind treasure — a gold ring etched with a Cyrillic inscription that translates to: "Lord, may you help your servant Maria."

That ring may have belonged to a princess; the coin stash was certainly fit for one. "The newfound hoard consists of over 6,600 items — silver coins and silver clumbs (tiny ingots) … wrapped in three linen pouches, packed in a basket and then put in the ceramic vessel," Adam Kędzierski, an archaeologist at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnology at the Polish Academy of Sciences, told Live Science in an email.