King Cnut Held By Hampshire Constabulary

Did you know that the Viking king Cnut was once handed into English police custody in the 1970s?! 

Well, sort of… On the 20th of September 1976 someone was out for a walk in Hampshire and stumbled across this near-1,000 year old silver penny of Cnut lying on the footpath. The good Samaritan decided to hand it into the local police station, where this Viking penny remained unclaimed and so was handed back to the finder.

It even has the original police lost property report!

The coin itself was minted by Aelfsige in Winchester, so the coin didn’t venture too far before it was lost, as is also evidenced by the lack of wear.

With the popularity of metal detecting, it’s hard to think that a find like this nowadays would be handed into the police but it makes for a great story, doesn’t it?

Cnut is often referred to as Anglo-Saxon but his heritage and activity were very much Viking in nature. He was king of England, Denmark, Norway and parts of Sweden for periods until his death in 1035.

Image credit: Hel-hama, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Cnut was no stranger to invading, having been involved in many of his father’s raids and, as an adult, it was Cnut who led a force of more than 10,000 men that invaded England in 1015, ultimately conquering this new territory, changing the history of England and the whole of northern Europe.

Bonus fun fact: Cnut’s grandfather was Harald Bluetooth, and was the inspiration for the name of the wireless technology so many of us are familiar with today.