A HOARD of ancient Roman coins recovered from near Malmesbury have been purchased by the Athelstan Museum and will become a permanent exhibit once they are restored.

The trove of coins was found in a ceramic jar near Milbourne in 2012 by a metal detectorist and was valued at around £9,000.

The collection of 1,266 bronze Roman coins were offered to the Athelstan Museum first and the team at the museum secured several grants as well as around £2,000 of funding from the public.

As well as being a huge number of coins the hoard comes from a period late in the Roman Empire when there were between two and four different rulers at once.

Most of the coins are a standard base metal denomination known as a nummus dating to the period AD 307-317, a time which came to be dominated by Constantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, and his pagan rival Licinius.

This acquisition follows the museum unveiling a new exhibit full of items from a find near Malmesbury covering several periods of the town’s history from ancient to medieval.

Maria Marsh, a curator at the museum, said that staff felt hugely privileged that they would be able to keep the coins in Malmesbury.

The coins will now be restored and funding for a display case will start being raised before the coins can go on display in the museum, which may takes several years.

“It’s almost indescribable going to the coin room in the British Museum and being given a crate of coins. It’s just amazing really because they are so, so old and there are so many of them,” she said.

“It was a privilege to go pick them up and bring them all back.

“There are arguments that say it could be someone’s savings or a group of people from the area who left money as an offering to the gods.

She added: “I always knew the Romans were here somewhere and now we’ve got proof for everybody to see.”