Image Credit: A chest of coins discovered during a salvage operation last summer. More than 1,000 coins were hauled from the sea, believed to have been minted in Spain’s South American colonies in the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Courtesy 1715 Fleet-Queen Jewels.
Recent discoveries have renewed archaeologists’ concerns that a shipwreck-salvage company has exclusive rights to artefacts aboard a sunken 1715 fleet
Divers uncovered more than 1,000 late 17th- and early 18th-century Spanish coins worth $1m off the coast of Florida last summer. The area, roughly 100 miles north of Miami, is known as the Treasure Coast—named for the cargo aboard the Spanish flotilla that sank there in 1715. Its 11 ships were filled to the brim with an estimated $400m in gold, silver and jewels. Treasure hunters have been on the prowl for their sunken riches ever since. This latest discovery marks the most significant find since the 1990s.
The Florida-based shipwreck-salvage company that discovered this latest trove of coins, 1715 Fleet-Queens Jewels, has exclusive rights to the remains of the 1715 fleet. Over the summer, its divers discovered not only 1,051 silver and five gold coins but also artefacts like a lead royal seal. But Queens Jewels is a for-profit company, and its jurisdiction in waters that contain important historical artefacts raises the problem of conflicting visions in exploration between treasure hunters and underwater archaeologists.
Read the full article on The Art Newspaper:
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2026/01/30/florida-coin-hoard-resurfaces-debate-over-treasure-hunting
