A man with a metal detector got the shock of his life when he found a gold ring buried in a field in Aldborough Hatch, but how did it end up there? Reporter Lara Keay investigates.

A far cry from the hustle and bustle of South Woodford, Ilford, or Gants Hill, Aldborough Hatch remains one of the quietest, most rural parts of Redbridge.

Surrounded by the greenery of Fairlop Waters and Hainault Forest, you would be easily forgiven for confusing parts of it with a sleepy English village in the heart of the countryside.

So when metal detectorist Richard Joynson went hunting for treasure there in 2011 he was not expecting to find anything interesting.

But to his “delight” he found a mysterious gold ring just two and a half centimetres underground.

He said: “A lot of the things I find are fairly ordinary.
“And like most metal detectorists I only search the top layers of the soil, which are usually ignored by archaeologists because they never find anything there.

“But occasionally, you find something amazing, like the ring.”

After reporting it under the Treasure Act, the ring was examined by experts at the British Museum, who believe it to date back to the 16th or 17th century.

Elaborately engraved with floral patterns, the ring has the words "Sis Memor A Mei" written on it, which means “remember me” in Latin.

The beautiful design suggests the ring belonged to a woman, and being made from pure gold, a wealthy one.

But the experts are undecided on where the ring might have come from.

Finds liaison officer at Colchester Museum Ben Paites said: “Looking at the design of the ring and comparing it with others we know the date for gives us a rough date range.

“Painted portraits from the time also show the jewellery style of the period.

“Posey rings were very popular in the 16th and 17th centuries, which bore verses, rhymes or other romantic inscriptions.

“Although it says “remember me”, it could have been given to a wife by her husband who was away a lot, like a sailor.”

But finds liaison officer for London Kate Sumnel believes the ring has darker origins.

She said: “The inscription is about remembrance, and the ring has traces of black enamel, which represent death.

“It’s definitely a mourning ring.”

Although it is impossible to know whether the ring was buried in Aldborough or simply dropped there by accident, some clues lie in what the area was like at the time.

In the 1500s Aldborough Hatch was owned by Barking Abbey.

But when Henry VIII abolished abbeys and monasteries in 1542 the Aldborough estate was given to a wealthy man called Bartholomew Barnes.

Aldborough would have been very sparsely populated at that time, but the ring does confirm people were living in what is now the London Borough of Redbridge in the post medieval period.

Whether the lucky lady who owned the ring lived in Aldborough itself we will never know.

But with very few personal objects dating that far into Redbridge’s past, it is a very important historical find.

The remembrance ring was bought by Redbridge Museum and is on display there until February 27, 2017.