Amateur metal detectors find a single ancient coin in Northern Germany, and thereby set off an investigation that reveals spectacular finds linking all the way back to Danish Viking King Harold Gormsson, also known as Harold Bluetooth (r. 958-986).  The computer you're using likely has linking software named after this kingly dude.

Fresh from the blood soaked earth, and the first view of it for over a thousand years.

The single thin silver coin has led to this, a hoard of Viking silver, with more likely to come.

Braided necklaces, pearls, brooches, a Thor’s hammer, rings and up to 600 chipped coins were found, including more than 100 that date back to Bluetooth’s era, when he ruled over what is now Denmark, northern Germany, southern Sweden and parts of Norway.

“This trove is the biggest single discovery of Bluetooth coins in the southern Baltic Sea region and is therefore of great significance,” the lead archaeologist, Michael Schirren, told national news agency DPA.

The oldest coin is a Damascus dirham dating to 714 while the most recent is a penny dating to 983.

The find suggests that the treasure may have been buried in the late 980s – also the period when Bluetooth was known to have fled to Pomerania, where he died in 987.

“We have here the rare case of a discovery that appears to corroborate historical sources,” said the archaeologist Detlef Jantzen.