The Curse of Oak Island: Rare Mystery Metal Unearthed (Season 10)

GARY DRAYTON: This area is
one of the last areas on Lot 7
that’s been cleared and
we haven’t detected.

JACK BEGLEY: Lead the way.

NARRATOR: Metal detection expert Gary
Drayton and Jack Begley arrive
on Lot 7, just west of Lot 8.
This hasn’t been farmed around here.
So nothing’s out of place.
Everything should be in situ.
I love your enthusiasm, mate.
I’m psyched.
I’m ready to get stuck in this area as well.

NARRATOR: In light of the potentially 500-year-old
[inaudible] that Gary and Marty Lagina recently found nearby.
All right, mate.
Let’s get stuck in.

JACK BEGLEY: Let’s find some artifacts, Gary.
GARY DRAYTON: All right, mate.

NARRATOR: The team hopes to unearth more important clues
from the surrounding area that could help identify
who may have visited this part of the island
prior to the discovery of the money pit
and also if they left anything of value behind.

[beeping]
Woo-hoo.
Oh.
We’ve got a signal, mate.
Nice.
Just there.

JACK BEGLEY: Mainly just roots.
Yeah.
Nice one, mate.

[beeping]
We can’t be very far away from it.

[beeping]

• You’re on it.
• Yeah, I’m on it.
  Going for it.

[rapid beeping]

• Wow.
• Oh.
  You got it.
  What is that?

GARY DRAYTON: Check this out.
Oh.
Sweet.
Musket ball.
Look at that.

JACK BEGLEY: I love finding those.
Fantastic, mate.
This is an oldie as well by the look of it.
What time period’s musket balls, Gary?

It’s a black powder weapon,
so late 1500s all the way into the mid to late 1800s.

JACK BEGLEY: That could fit in with Portugal, too.
Well, we still haven’t discovered
how old that musket lock plate is
that we recovered on Lot 8.

Mm-hmm.
Just nearby.
Yeah.
So they could be connected.

NARRATOR: A lead musket ball?
Could it be related to the potential 16th-century musket rifle flintlock
that Gary and Marty Lagina found near this area one year ago?
And might they both be related to the ancient
[inaudible] found on Lot 8 that was designed for hauling heavy cargo?
Each musket ball is its own little piece of art.

NARRATOR: If so, could this musket ball
have been fired in order to protect something of great value?

GARY DRAYTON: When I think of musket balls,
we are in Canada, North America.
I’ve got to go back to colonial days on that,
mid to late 1700s.

JACK BEGLEY: Yeah.

• Fantastic.
  No, I love them.
• Yep.
  See if it’s got any friends in the area.

[beeping]
Oh.
JACK BEGLEY: That’s a nice signal.
GARY DRAYTON: Yeah, that’s a nice signal, mate.
Just there, mate.
That’s my best guesstimate.

What, you on a rock?
Yeah.
That rock stopped whatever it is from sinking deeper.

[rapid beeping]
It’s there, mate.

[beeping]
Sure there– oh.
Is it that?
That’s a rock.
Yeah, it looks like a rock, but–

[shrill beeping]
–is it?
Because if this isn’t a rock–
Oh.
Wow.
When I first saw it–
because I was the same as you.
It’s a rock.

• Yeah.
  But it isn’t.
  It’s metal.
  And, uh–
  And it’s rectangular.
  Yeah, it’s rectangular.
  And it’s got some little markings on it.

JACK BEGLEY: You think those are markings?
Yeah.
I’d just be guessing what it is, but that shape–
this could potentially be an old coin.
That’s what it looks like to me, mate.

Oh, that’d be great.
That’s how they were made.
You get square ones.
You get oblong ones.
You get triangle ones.
And I’m not sure yet whether it’s copper or silver.

NARRATOR: A possible coin and potentially made of silver?
If so, could it be connected to the [inaudible]
that Gary and Marty recently found nearby on Lot 8
or perhaps the evidence of precious metals
that have been detected in the money pit?

I mean, look at that.
Look how it goes down into a point there.
It’s just the irregularity of it.
There’s something special about this.
Wow.
I’m seeing a design on that, mate.
But we don’t have to speculate.
All the finds go back to the lab.
Put them under the CT scanner.
Get those guys to tell us what metal it is.
It’s an interesting find.
That is for sure.

JACK BEGLEY: Yeah.
I agree.
Great find, Gary.
GARY DRAYTON: Fantastic, mate.
Good digging.

RICK LAGINA: Laird.
LAIRD NIVEN: Hello.
How are you?
Well, you tell me how I’m going to be after you find out what this is.

NARRATOR: Rick Lagina, along with Jack Begley and Gary Drayton,
join archaeologists Laird Niven and Emma Culligan
in the Oak Island Interpretive Center.
Well, this is a little piece that Gary and Jack found on Lot 7.

NARRATOR: Laird and Emma have spent the last several hours
scanning the believed coin that was found one day ago on Lot 7
with the Skyscan 1273 CT scanner.
Can you show us the edge, Emma, please?
Yeah.

LAIRD NIVEN: Right now, this is the CT scan.
It’s an interesting-looking piece.
The edges are strange.

GARY DRAYTON: It looks like whatever the metal is was cut with shears.
Just cut like this.

GARY DRAYTON: It looks like it could be something really special.
I was hoping that it was some kind of coin.

I think you might find what Emma has to say a little more interesting.
OK.
That’s always great.
Emma, do you want to come up–
Sure thing.
LAIRD NIVEN: –tell them what you found?

NARRATOR: Additionally, the artifact has been scanned
with an X-ray fluorescence spectrometer, or XRF device,
which can identify the types of elements and metals
that make up an object’s composition.

So what was really interesting about this is the actual material properties.
This is the XRF analysis.
So it’s mainly copper, which wasn’t too surprising.
Then it had an extremely high tin content, which makes it bronze,
along with a really high arsenic content, which makes it an arsenical bronze,
and that stands out to me.

What would be the point of a metal mixture like this?
It increases their tensile strength
and it also reduces flaking.
Yeah.
So anything with a high arsenic content
has a low vaporizing point that’s lower than its melting point of other metals.
So during forging or casting, there’d be a lot of arsenic gas in the air,
which would affect your nervous system.

So there was this long period of just it phasing out.
And because it is a phased-out metal,
it is not a modern metal by any means.
16th century onwards, it’s nonexistent.
They stopped making this type of metal–
EMMA CULLIGAN: They stopped making it.

–in the 1500s?
Yes.
Yeah.
That is absolutely brilliant.
It is pretty old, yeah.

NARRATOR: The possible coin found on Lot 7,
potentially predating the 16th century?
If so, could it offer more evidence to support the beliefs of theorists
like Scott Clark that the Knights Templar may have been behind the Oak Island mystery?

It was common for coins, but it was also used for swords.
It was used for statues.
But the shape– really reminiscent of a coin here.
Yeah.
Yes, I knew it.
It’s quite exciting.
Yeah, it is.
Quite fascinating.

It’s time to get back out there and take a look,
see what else we can find.
Yep, we can do that for sure.

• All righty.
• See you later.
  See ya.
  See you later, guys.
  Thanks for the great news.
  I had a feeling about that.