1000 yr old coins

[lacey]

http://www.news.com.au/technology/sci-tech/coins-found-in-northern-territory-may-rewrite-australian-history/story-fn5fsgyc-1226646189425?utm_source=outbrain&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=technology

[Sapyx]

I saw the Fox News and Yahoo versions of this story, which all said much the same thing.

First off, the "Kilwa Sultanate" didn't start issuing coins until the 1300s, so "thousand-year-old coins" is a bit of an exaggeration. Assuming, of course, that the museum guys have IDed the coins properly and that they're not simply Indonesian Native States coins from the 1800s.

Second, the standard of evidence required to "rewrite history" is not yet met. All we've got is an anecdotal story of how some guy said he found some coins 60 years ago. Most UFO sightings are better documented. Until proper archaeologists actually find a cache of coins that can be proven to have lain buried for 700 years or so, then we've got nothing to write home about; those coins could have been dumped there by a much more recent visitor to these shores.

Finally, I'm not entirely sure it would "rewrite history" all that much. We know that pre-European Indonesians were perfectly aware that Australia was here, just as the pre-1770 Dutch and Portuguese knew it was here; its just that none of them bothered coming here very often, because they had no reason to. Muslim trader-explorers were motivated by the same things European ones were: gold, glory and God. As far as northern Australia is concerned, there were no valuable trade goods to buy, no recognizable governments to trade with or conquer, no willing natives to convert to their religion (just plenty of unwilling ones). But, as far as I am aware, no-one doubts that pre-European visitors from Indonesia fished just offshore from Australia a thousand years ago. That some of those fishermen might have come ashore (looking for water, or lost in a cyclone, or whatever) would be inevitable.