In summer 1938 he opened three mounds (2,3 and 4) for Mrs Pretty. All had been looted, but two contained cremation burials, and traces of a buried boat were found in the other. Lots of interesting ornaments of metal, glass and bone, and the remains of iron weapons, suggested that these had been the graves of important, pagan Anglo-Saxons, from about AD 625-670.


Divine intervention

It is said that Mrs Pretty had a dream there was treasure in Mound 1 (the largest grave) where she saw and heard the funeral procession. Another account tells how one evening she saw the figure of an armed warrior standing on the mound in the twilight.  Finally, she is said to have employed a dowser who divined gold beneath it. 

Basil Brown returned to Sutton Hoo in May 1939 and drove a trench through Mound 1. Soon he came across iron ship-rivets in the sandy soil, which he carefully left in position. Following their patterns, he began to uncover a huge ship, its belly still deep below the mound. 

All the wood had rotted away, leaving an impression of the planks, like a fossil. With patience and skill, he revealed a ship's outline – almost 90ft long and 15ft wide, with room for 20 rowers on each side. 

A princely treasure

This was an awesome sight, but the discovery had to be kept top secret. Mrs Pretty encouraged Basil Brown to keep digging, and so did a medium that she sent to him. Then, deep within the ship, he reached the grave itself and almost at once an awe-inspiring array of the dead man's possessions began to appear.  They included gold jewellery, silver plate, weapons, textiles, leather, cups, drinking horns and a helmet. 

They had never been stolen because, over the centuries, one end of the mound had been ploughed away, misleading looters into digging in the wrong place. The contents of the grave were a snapshot of Anglo-Saxon technology and traditions. Mrs Pretty began to realise just how important the find was and called on a group of experts from the British Museum.


Storm clouds gathering

As the second world war loomed, the team had to work quickly. The original records of the excavation were, in fact, destroyed during the war and only pictures taken by two amateur photographers survive to show us the remarkable riveted outline of the ship that had been impressed in the sand.

During the Blitz, the finds were entrusted to the British Museum and stored safely in the London Underground. Mrs Pretty, who died in 1942, gave the artefacts to the nation. 

The buried ship and its treasure are still one of the most important finds in British archaeology and have provided us with a crucial physical link to the Anglo-Saxon world.