It took not one, not two, but six people to dig such a deep hole.
In 2018, six people dug a 24-meter-deep hole inside a listed building in Veria, hoping to find treasure. They even arrived in this area from different regions of Greece and stayed in the city for 40 days until they began to realize their cherished goal. And since the building was classified as an archaeological site, they were accused of illegal excavations and using a metal detector on cultural sites protected by law, as well as in damage to a monument.
The five-member Thessaloniki Criminal Court of Appeal acquitted them of the first charge because it accepted the treasure hunters’ claim that they were not looking for antiquities, but only gold coins. The court found them guilty of two other charges, sentencing one defendant to four years in prison and the remaining five to 12 months in prison, suspended for three years.
Testifying in court, the black diggers admitted that they were all in dire financial straits and stated that when information reached their ears that two boxes of gold coins were buried in the house, they decided to go to Veria and find the treasure. “We thought that if we found them, we would be saved,” said one of the accused.
“Naively thinking, we thought that after five meters we would find pounds, but the metal detector continued to show a “target”, and we began to dig further,” he added, and stated that they had to dig several meters before they realized that the detector it signals not because it detects pounds, but… by itself (apparently there is some kind of glitch). “We didn’t even know that ancient artifacts existed there. We only wanted gold coins,” another accused said.
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