Oak Island

[ex infernis]

I have a book that has a little info on mystery like frogs and other animals falling from the sky and Ufos and one of the mysterys is about OaK island. a small island of the coast of Canada and on the island one teenager fount a small pit and what looked like a pulley so the next day he came back with some friends and they started to dig and when they got about ten feet down they found planks they removed the planks and they dug down another ten feet and found so more planks. a few days later they got to fifty feet and they left for the day and the next day they found the shaft flooded they tryed to get the water of but it kept comming in, after a while a company bought the area and drilled down thought the water and found a nother layer of planks and parts of a gold chain. they lowed a camera down into the hole and one of the people looking at the feed said he saw a chest another said he saw a human hand. a theory on who put it there are that knights put their gold and riches there. what do you think?

[Craft]

Here are some of the Facts about Oak Island:

http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topic...land/story.html

[Foxe]

The sad thing about Oak Island is that many of the "Facts" which people quote about it are just not "Facts" at all. Let's have a quick look at some of the most significant aspects of the so called "Money pit".

The Flagstones and Oak Platforms: According to the stories about Oak Island Daniel McGinnis and his friends managed to dig down to about 30 feet in 1795 and discovered a layer of flagstones just below the surface and then layers of oak platforms every 10 feet or so. In about 1804 or thereabouts they returned to the pit with their company, the Onslow Company, and continued digging to about 90ft, discovering the same oak platforms every 10 ft. These platforms undoubtedly constitute the best evidence for the existence of some kind of deep pit. However, since 1804 nobody has seen any evidence of the oak platforms or flagstones, they seem to have just disappeared. So, how do we know about them? It's easy to assume that McGinnis or one of his associates on those first two digs must have left records and reports of the details and nature of the finds in the pit, BUT they didn't. There is absolutely no mention whatsoever of the oak platforms etc until about 1862, nearly 70 years after they were supposedly discovered. The man who first mentioned them (McNally) had never seen them, offered absolutely no idea as to how he knew of their existence, and even admitted himself that he couldn't say for certain they existed. Since he was engaged at the time in fund-raising - at which he was pretty successful - and thus had a very strong ulterior motive for "creating" evidence about the pit, anyone with half a brain must surely take his testimony with a bloody great spoonful of salt. We know McNally didn't know about the findings of the earlier digs himself, he admits that he isn't sure what they found, and we know that he had a motive for making stuff up. Under any other circumstances we would instantly draw a big question mark over everything he said. However, this is the Money Pit, so we believe everything we are told without question.

The Inscribed Stone: At about 90 ft McGinnis and co supposedly found a stone inscribed with strange markings. When de-coded the stone said something like "forty feet below here two million pounds are buried". But, no original drawing of the stone or the inscription survives and the stone itself has disappeared - if it ever existed. Like the oak platforms, no mention is made of the stone until decades after its supposed discovery. No reliable diagram of its inscription exists, those that do exist are all copied form one another and are of unknown origin - certainly there is no evidence that they were copied from the stone or from and 1804-era drawing of it. There is in fact no evidence that the stone ever existed. The translation of the code was pronounced by "an expert", but nobody seems quite sure who this expert was or when or where or how he came to his conclusions. Countless experts have stated that the wording of the inscription (if in any way accurate) is not consistent with a pre-1795 date.

The Flood Tunnel: After the oak platforms the supposed flood tunnel, "discovered" by McGinnis and co at a little over 90ft, is the best evidence for a man-made pit of great construction. However, like the oak platforms and inscribed stone no mention of the flood tunnel is made until decades after its supposed discovery. No physical evidence of an actual man-made flood tunnel has been seen since, except for the fact that every time someone digs a deep pit on Oak Island it fills up with water. Oak Island is very low lying and a pit of 90ft would reach depths of about 60 or so feet below sea level. At that depth the pressure is enormous so it's no surprise that the holes fill up with water. The very fact that other holes on the island fill with water at that kind of depth is very telling - they can't all have hidden booby-trap flood tunnels, yet still they flood. Why then should the money pit need a booby-trap to make it flood?

Drilling Reveals a Treasure Chest: "At 98 feet the drill went through a spruce platform. Then it encountered 4 inches of oak and then 22 inches of what was characterized as "metal in pieces""; Next 8 inches of oak, another 22 inches of metal, 4 inches of oak and another layer of spruce. The conclusion was that they had drilled through 2 casks or chests filled will coins." (snipped from the Active Mind website). What the Active Mind fails to make clear - in fact its use of incorrect terms actually clouds the issue heavily - is that the drilling which took place was not core sample drilling in which a section of the earth is brought up to the surface for examination, but was simply normal drilling. The guy who was operating the drill said "hey, this feels like oak" and his word was taken at face value. The truth is that it would have been impossible for anyone to make an accurate statement about what they were drilling through. Even modern experienced drillers with the finest new technology cannot say with any degree of certainty exactly what substance they are drilling through, so there is no way that anyone could possibly have known that their drill went through two different types of wood. There are two other important points about these supposed chests: the first is that no mention of them is made until years after the event, again throwing doubt on the accuracy of the report. The second is that two large chests of gold at 98 feet casts enormous doubt on the accuracy of the inscribed stone. Do you believe in the discovery of the stone or the discovery of the treasure chests? If you give it any thought and aren't a moron you won't believe in either since neither of them have anything but heresay to support their authenticity.

All of the above was "discovered" before anybody started keeping records of the Oak Island excavations, so there is no real evidence of any of it actually having been discovered. The earliest finds were not reported until nearly 70 years later, and then by someone who admitted being unsure of what was found. Since that includes the best evidence for the existence of a Money Pit, we must seriously consider the possibility that there really is nothing there. Despite another century of digging nothing of any significane (and certainly nothing that cannot be attributed to earlier digging works) was found until Daniel Blankenship and his company, Triton, took over excavation in the 1960s.

The Video Evidence: In 1976 Triton lowered a camera down into one of their holes and the footage shows a severed hand and wooden chests. Firstly, the camera was not lowered into the Money Pit. Nobody knows where the Money Pit is any more, since 2 centuries of excavations have pock-marked that area of the island with countless pits and holes. The camera was lowered into borehole 10-X, an estimated 180 feet away from the Money Pit. And yet there are treasure chests at the bottom? There are two Money Pits? Come off it! Actually, if anyone has seen the footage they will know just how sketchy it is. One bit looks like it might be footage of a severed hand, but it is dark and murky and there is just no way of being sure what it is. If we accept that it looks like a hand then it would be nice if someone could explain how a hand has remained buried but un-decomposed for well over 200 years. The "treasure chests" are even worse. Yes, the footage looks like pieces of wood, but there is no scale and no sense of perspective, you might be looking at something the size of a door or the size of a ruler. In either case the footage just isn't good enough to say what it might be. Claims have also been made about a human body appearing on the footage. I've seen the Triton footage several times and have never seen a human body. If it does appear to show a human body then the same questions of decomposition must be raised as about the "hand"

Theories

There are a hundred theories about who created the Oak Island Money Pit. Personally, I have grave doubts about the very existence of the Money Pit. Even if one accepts its existence there is not enough good evidence about its construction to make any kind of supoprtable thesis about who built it, when, why and how. However, there is one very important clue which helps us put the theories in perspective.

If we believe anything about the story then Daniel McGinnis came across the pit in 1795. He knew there was something there because there was a dip in the ground in a clearing in the undergrowth and a block and tackle hanging from a tree. It is not unreasonable to believe this part of the story, for although there is no actual evidence to support it McGinnis must have seen something or he would never have known about the depression in the ground (whatever it was caused by). A wooden block and hemp rope hanging from a tree would have a definitely limited lifespan, so they cannot have been placed there more than a few years before McGinnis found them, let's be generous and say a hundred years. However, a clearing in the undergrowth lasts how long? A decade? A year? In my garden clearings seem to last for a few months if I'm lucky, but let's be generous again and say a decade. Without the clearing in the undergrowth in 1795 we would never have even heard of the Money Pit, and the clearing can't really have been made before 1785 at the earliest. Well, that throws out all theories about Templars, Francis Bacon, Incas, Captain Kidd and anything else that early.

I don't expect anyone to read this post and suddenly convert from being a believer in the Oak Island treasure, but hopefully it will give food for thought to any waverers. "Facts" about Oak Island are more often than not "Fantasy".

Edited November 29, 2005 by Foxe

[+DieChecker]

It would still be nice to know once and for all about what is under that island. I've seen archeological digs at sea on TV where they built a huge wall around the wreck or what ever they were looking at.

It should be possible to encircle the part of the island that is suspect and then dig up everything. You could probably get a hundred volunteer archeology students to help and organize the dig.

The island was for sale a while back. I hope someone rich buys it and does a proper dig to find what is there.

[citrus13]

a little off topic here... and maybe, just maybe in all life's hectic runaround... think of this:

NO MATTER WHAT IT IS, OR HOW IT HAPPENS....

SOMEONE KNOWS

OF ALL LIFES MYSTERIES... AND EVERYTHING THAT HAS HAPPENED....

WHETHER WE KNOW OR NOT....

SOMEONE, SOMEWHERE IN TIME... KNOWS............

LIKE THIS ISLAND FOR INSTANCE......

NO MATTER HOW MUCH WE LOOK FOR ANSWERS... AND BE IT SKEPTIC OR NOT........

WHETHER YOU BELIEVE OR NOT IN ANY OF LIFE'S MYSTERIES...

SOMEONE KNOWS

*just my thoughts*

[chunga]

I have a book that has a little info on mystery like frogs and other animals falling from the sky and Ufos and one of the mysterys is about OaK island. a small island of the coast of Canada and on the island one teenager fount a small pit and what looked like a pulley so the next day he came back with some friends and they started to dig and when they got about ten feet down they found planks they removed the planks and they dug down another ten feet and found so more planks. a few days later they got to fifty feet and they left for the day and the next day they found the shaft flooded they tryed to get the water of but it kept comming in, after a while a company bought the area and drilled down thought the water and found a nother layer of planks and parts of a gold chain. they lowed a camera down into the hole and one of the people looking at the feed said he saw a chest another said he saw a human hand. a theory on who put it there are that knights put their gold and riches there. what do you think?

Indeed, I know much of the OAK ISLAND Mystery. If I have time later this evening I can relay to you several new eneavers going on as we speak to finaly unravel this mystery. bye

[Doctor_Strangelove]

I've heard of that. It's an island out east and they say it could have the Holy Grail in a pit on it.

Yes, I am not all that knowledgable on the subject. I just saw it on some show.

[ex infernis]

Here are some of the Facts about Oak Island:

http://www.activemind.com/Mysterious/Topic...land/story.html

nice site it has lots of info

[SoLLiZ]

i have to agree with foxe in this one, although hemp rope can last quite a while in the right conditions.

an intresting fact about the money pit; in his younger days, before polio left him in a wheelchair, FDR went and explored the island and money pit with some friends.

[LizFL]

Ok, so that hand- was this in the water, side of the tunnel, an open dry space, what were the surroundings?

Edit: Ok, so I did a google search and could come up with none of the footage that was taken of the supposed hand. where would one find this?

Edited November 30, 2005 by Frank'n'Liz

[Foxe]

The footage reappears just about every time someone makes a "documentary" about Oak Island, but I can't find it online, not even any stills from it either.

The images are murky and unclear, with no sense of scale (hey, the "hand" might be a giant squid!), but if I recall correctly the hand was in water.

The real issue though is that borehole 10-X is nowhere near the "Money Pit". By believing in the severed hand and the "treasure chests" one is actually believing in a second, completely seperate money pit. Personally, I find the idea of one money pit hard to swallow, but to accept that there are 2...

Thankyou SoLLiZ and Frank'n'Liz, I was beginning to wonder if anyone was actually reading my post

[Byuu94]

The real issue though is that borehole 10-X is nowhere near the "Money Pit".

Wait, you said earlier that no-one knows where the original Monry Pit is, but 10-X is nowhere near it.

[Foxe]

Sorry, a little confusing I know.

The exact location of the supposed money pit is no longer known, but its approximate location is. The money pit supposedly had a diameter of about 13ft (depending on who you read). Say you wanted to put a borehole down in the middle of the money pit, if your were wrong in your estimate by more than 6'6" you'd miss the pit entirely. So, its exact location is sadly now lost because of the sheer number of holes and depressions in the immediate area.

However, as I say, the approximate loaction of the money pit is known... "It's about over there in that area somewhere..." and borehole 10-X is 180ft away from that area. If we allow for say a 50 x 50ft area for the approximate location of the money pit then borehole 10-X might be anything between 130 and 230ft away. Whatever the exact distance, seeing stuff at the bottom of the borehole is a heck of a way off from seeing stuff at the bottom of the money pit.

[LizFL]

just a curious kinda off topic question that in my mind relates-

Foxe - You seem quite informed on this subject. I was wondering, approximately how many discoveries of buried treasure have there been? As many stories as we have all heard, I have never actually heard of "real" buried treasure.

In your personal opinion, do you believe there is treasure in the money pit?

If not, do you think it is some sort of natural coincidence that there was wood, putty and so forth? or was it an elaborate hoax?

Also, if the websites are correct, then it is a false beach by the money pit with an elaborate drainage system, wouldn't digging up an entire beach, building the channels and refilling it take a while? wouldn't there be more evidence of people making camp for a period of a few weeks or possibly months, such as trash or something of the sort?

[Foxe]

Perhaps I ought to explain how I come into this.

I've always had an interest in the obscure and mysterious. The ideas of secret societies, ancient civilisations, visitors from space and whatnot intrigue me. But there is another side to my nature; I am, by profession, a maritime historian, and one of my particular subjects is the history of piracy - not the legend of piracy, but the genuine history. So, as well as having an interest in the mysterious I approached the Oak Island enigma from an historian's point of view, having had it thrust upon me because of my work.

There are a handful of genuine examples of buried treasure, but it certainly wasn't common. The interesting thing about buried treasure is that where we know any details about it there seems to have been a reason specific to the time and place for burying it. For example, the most famous buried treasure is probably that of Captain Kidd. After a short career as a pirate Kidd had amassed quite a fortune and was hoping to get a pardon from the Earl of Bellomont in New York. Kidd knew that if Bellomont got hold of his treasure then his life would be worthless and he'd have no bargaining tools, but as long as he alone knew the location of a large haul he ought to have been safe. So, Kidd buried the bulk of his treasure on Gardiner's Island, NY, and then sailed to meet Bellomont. The plan backfired, Kidd was arrested and the treasure on Gardiner's Island was recovered. Kidd maintained that he had a larger treasure buried somehwere else, but it was almost certainly just a ruse to avoid being hanged. That ruse didn't work either and he was hanged anyway. Of course, hundreds of people have set off to find the missing portion of Kidd's treasure, which probably doesn't exist. In the 1920-30s a handful of Kidd treasure maps turned up, but they are almost certainly forgeries - certainly the experts believe so. The fact that at least 4 were "discovered" by the same person makes it look very fishy.

There are other examples: Francis Drake buried a load of silver when he was being pursued by the Spanish in South America. He and his men could not out-run the Spaniards while they were carrying the silver so they buried it. They dug it up again a few days later when they were free of pursuit. Calico Jack Rackham and his men buried some of their loot (which was probably more commodities than gold and silver) in barrels because their ship was too full to fit any more loot in. There are probably 2 or 3 more examples.

Some buried, or at least hidden treasure has been found. People claim to have found gold on Cocos Island, and quite recently something like 600 barrels of silver was found on Crusoe Island in the Pacific.

I don't personally believe that there is any treasure buried on Oak Island. The logic is just completely screwed up. If you're burying treasure then the chances are that you're in a hurry, and in any case the most important thing is to hide the treasure. The best, most effective way of hiding treasure is to dig a small hole (doesn't take long) stick the stuff in the hole, and cover it up. Then, remove all trace of your digging work so that nobody would ever know there was treasure buried there.

That might not be exactly how everyone would do it but there is one thing that you just wouldn't do. You wouldn't dig a 200ft pit, taking months of work and several expert engineers, leave your treasure at the bottom of it where even you can't get it back, then leave such obvious clues as to its whereabouts as a clearing and depression in the ground, not to mention your lifting tackle, so that a 12 year old boy can find where you've hidden it. You'd have to be freaking stupid!

I don't believe that the wood and putty and suchlike are either a natural coincidence or a hoax. I don't believe they were ever there. The evidence for their existence is completely flawed and 100% unreliable. In my opinion they were invented by McNally or one of his associates when they were trying to raise funds in the 1860s. None of the important structures supposedly in the money pit were mentioned by any of the poeple who supposedly found them, and since McNally told the world about them none of them have ever been found. In short we are taking the word of one man with no personal knowledge of the supposed structures and an obvious ulterior motive for inventing them - and even he admitted that he wasn't sure about them! If it were anything else then even the most die-hard believer would admit that it was probably all lies, but as it is books and websites just take McNally's word for it.

The artificial beach is a bit of an odd one. "Experts" who believe in the money pit can give you good reasons why the beach is artificial, "experts" who don't can give you good reasons why the beach is not artificial. Since most Oak Island websites believe everything they are told, and expect their readers to do likewise they tend to side with the experts who say the beach is artificial. Really the issue is inconclusive: if you believe in the money pit then you'll probably believe in the artificial beach; if you don't then you won't. One thing is certain though, despite what many websites say there just isn't enough evidence to say for certain either way.

The argument about making camp is a good one. Estimate vary but there is no doubt that if the Money Pit were real it would have taken a good lot of people a good long time to construct, yet there is no sign either of a habitation for them or of any external workings. Apparently they meticulously cleared up every sign that they had ever been there but failed to notice a pulley on a tree over a hole in the ground...

Anyone interested in questioning the "facts" about Oak Island might like to have a look at

http://www.criticalenquiry.org/oakisland/index.html for a fairly good summary of the sceptical point of view.

[LizFL]

Wow, thank you Foxe for the wonderful information. it definately gives me some new points of view.

Your proffession sounds very interesting. I might have to PM you a few more questions that are even more off topic than my last lot!!

Also, excellent point about how they must have cleaned everything but forgot about the pully. Imagine that blunder, making it so people never even knew you were there but forgetting to take down the pully that marks the spot where you buried your treasure. sounds like something I would do!!

I am also wondering, with modern technology, isnt there some kind of way for people to check whats underground before they dig, like some kind of sonar or something of the sort? A good hollywood example would be jurrasic park where they took a scan of the skeleton of a raptor. Alas, I know that is hollywood-but is there anything comparable in real life?

[SoLLiZ]

hey foxe, quick question for ya.

which is more plausible? that there is a money pit on oak island, or that is a pirate ship trapped in a cave and by going through tunnels under an old abandoned restraunt, you can find this ship and get all the riches and keep you and your friends from having to leave the boondocks?

sorry. i watched goonies earlier today.

[Foxe]

Were it not for the issue of how the pirates managed to turn their ship around in a small cave so that it was pointingoutwards, and the question of how 6 kids with no previous experience of square-riggers managed to competently sail it out of the cave I would say without question that Goonies is the more plausible story...

It certainly requires less blind faith.

[gollo]

hey when I was a kid, we used to go to Scarborough Mere (north east uk) and they had a proper pirate ship called the "Hispaniola". They used to take you across to the water to the treasure island, and make you dig for treasure. If you didn't find any gold coins they said they wouldn't take you back. (i used to get really scared i wouldn't find any treasure!)

Anyway enough of my childhood trauma!

i just wanted to know if the "Hispaniola" actually existed, and this seems like the best place to ask!

[Lord Umbarger]

Interesting question for you. If "pirates" or any other sailers for that matter were to go to an island and spend a good length of time there digging a hole, couldn't they just live on the ship without the need for building a camp?

I do think that it is unlikely that people who made thier living on a ship would be so careless about leaving part of thier equipment behind. Even if they had extra pulleys, I don't think they would be so forgetful about a potentially life saving tool.

[Foxe]

The Hispaniola was the name of the ship in Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. I don't know where RLS got the name from, but I certainly don't know of any real pirate ships of that name. Possibly RLS named it after another non-pirate ship he knew of, possibly he just named it after the island.

Interesting question for you. If "pirates" or any other sailers for that matter were to go to an island and spend a good length of time there digging a hole, couldn't they just live on the ship without the need for building a camp?

I do think that it is unlikely that people who made thier living on a ship would be so careless about leaving part of thier equipment behind. Even if they had extra pulleys, I don't think they would be so forgetful about a potentially life saving tool.

They could live on their ship, but generally speaking the common practice was to go ashore as often as possible unless there was some particular reason not to. If they were going to stay at an island for any length of time (as they would have had to to dig a deep pit with booby traps etc) then it's highly unlikely they'd have stayed on their ship. Not impossible, but highly unlikely.

Your second point is a good one. No boatswain worth his salt would ever allow his men to leave a block and tackle behind unneccesarily.

[Foxe]

The Hispaniola was the name of the ship in Robert Louis Stevenson's Treasure Island. I don't know where RLS got the name from, but I certainly don't know of any real pirate ships of that name. Possibly RLS named it after another non-pirate ship he knew of, possibly he just named it after the island.

Interesting question for you. If "pirates" or any other sailers for that matter were to go to an island and spend a good length of time there digging a hole, couldn't they just live on the ship without the need for building a camp?

I do think that it is unlikely that people who made thier living on a ship would be so careless about leaving part of thier equipment behind. Even if they had extra pulleys, I don't think they would be so forgetful about a potentially life saving tool.

They could live on their ship, but generally speaking the common practice was to go ashore as often as possible unless there was some particular reason not to. If they were going to stay at an island for any length of time (as they would have had to to dig a deep pit with booby traps etc) then it's highly unlikely they'd have stayed on their ship. Not impossible, but highly unlikely.

Your second point is a good one. No boatswain worth his salt would ever allow his men to leave a block and tackle behind unneccesarily.

[Azalin]

could[/i] live on their ship, but generally speaking the common practice was to go ashore as often as possible unless there was some particular reason not to. If they were going to stay at an island for any length of time (as they would have had to to dig a deep pit with booby traps etc) then it's highly unlikely they'd have stayed on their ship. Not impossible, but highly unlikely.

This is true, and in fact most sailors, ironically enough hated the water. The average sailor generally did not even know how to swim. Personally I do believe in Oak Islands treasure, and I hope someone with some decent funds did buy it, and will figure out it's mystery. Im still a firm believer in the Templar Knights theory, that they sailed across the ocean, and buried their treasure in that location. Being under the orders of the church, they might of tried to do the best masoning and trap making they possibly could to ensure it would never be recovered. If this is true, then it shows, cause we still cannot access whats down there. Not only did they want to bury it, but they wanted to make it un-reachable, by anyone, including themselves. The idea with the pulley, indeed, seems sloppy, my only suggestion is that they had to perhaps leave in a hurry. Other then that, maybe they did in fact want to mark it for themselves.

[Foxe]

Even if one accepts the existence of the money pit (which I don't, but that's by the bye) the real problem with the Templar theory is the issue of time.

The Templar fleet supposedly disappeared sometime around 1307. If we imagine that it took them, say, 25 years to dig the Money Pit and rig up the booby traps etc that takes us to 1332.

In 1795 McGinnis found the Money Pit, which he noticed because of three things: a clearing in the undergrowth, a depression in the ground, and the remains of the lifting tackle.

It's unlikely (so unlikely as to be almost impossible) that a wooden block and hemp rope could have survived 463+ years in the elements intact. Pro-money pit investigators have speculated that perhaps there never was a block and tackle and that what McGinnis saw was the marking on a tree where one had been. This doesn't really solve the issue, because it's unlikely that marks on a tree like that would last 463+ years either. All it really does is admit that there's some doubt about the early reports.

The depression in the ground might well have survived. Archaeologists today very often look at anomolies in the surface of the ground to know where to dig, so there's no issue about the dip in the ground being there after 463+ years. However, McGinnis couldn't have seen the dip if it was covered in undergrowth, which brings me to the clearing.

Clearings in undergrowth do not last 463 days, let alone years. If you don't believe me then try it. Go into the woods and clear some undergrowth. If you want to make a better experiment then hang a wooden bloack with some hemp rope on a tree above it. Go back periodically and see how long either last. The block and tackle might well last a few years, but the clearing will be filled up again within a year, and within 2 or 3 years you won't even be able to tell where your clearing was, let alone see the ground underneath it. Clearings in the undergrowth just don't last nearly half a millenium!

There must have been a clearing in the undergrowth otherwise McGinnis cannot have seen the money pit. That clearing cannot have been made by the Templars. Therefore, it is inescapable that the Templars did not dig the money pit. Unless you've got some explanation that is...

The issue of time is really the downfall of almost all the theories about who dug the money pit. For McGinnis to have found the money pit it cannot have been dug more than a few years before 1795. It can't have been Captain Kidd, the Templars, Francis Bacon, Incas, Aztecs, William Phips or anyone much before 1780. After 1780 Oak Island and the surrounding area were inhabited, which rather throws into doubt the possibility of digging a 200ft pit, burying treasure at the bottom and filling it with booby-traps without anyone noticing!

[Welsh Shaun]

Foxe, do you have any logical theories, to origin and date.