Mercian Trail
Group of museums and historical sites in the West Midlands
The Mercian Trail is the name given to a group of museums and historical sites in the West Midlands of England that will be used to display objects from the Staffordshire Hoard. The trail is organised by a partnership of Lichfield District Council, Tamworth Borough Council, Staffordshire County Council, Stoke-on-Trent City Council and Birmingham City Council, and features the following locations:
Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery (52.4802°N 1.9036°W / 52.4802; -1.9036 (Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery))
Potteries Museum & Art Gallery (53.0229°N 2.1781°W / 53.0229; -2.1781 (Potteries Museum & Art Gallery))
Lichfield Cathedral (52.6855°N 1.8305°W / 52.6855; -1.8305 (Lichfield Cathedral))
Tamworth Castle (52.6327°N 1.6968°W / 52.6327; -1.6968 (Tamworth Castle))
Most of the objects from the Staffordshire Hoard will be put on display at these four locations, although other locations may be included in the trail in the future. In addition a touring exhibition will take some objects from the hoard to other parts of the West Midlands, starting with the Shire Hall Gallery in Stafford. This exhibition will tie in with a display in the nearby Ancient High House Museum, entitled: 'Out of the Dark Ages: Stafford's Anglo-Saxon Origins'. The Ancient High House exhibition, which runs from 28 June to 1 October, examines the coming of the Anglo-Saxons and the emergence of the Kingdom of Mercia as well as telling the story of the Saxon burh founded in 913. The display cabinets include a selection of coins and artefacts including a wealth of domestic and personal items, these in contrast to the largely martial artefacts of the Hoard.
Background
The Staffordshire Hoard was discovered in a field in Hammerwich, near Lichfield in July 2009. After the hoard was declared treasure in September 2009, it was valued at £3.285 million, and a public appeal was launched to raise the money in order for Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery and the Potteries Museum & Art Gallery to jointly purchase the hoard. On 23 March 2010 it was announced that the required sum had been raised, and that the hoard would be purchased by these two museums for display in the West Midlands.
Purpose
The Mercian Trail is not only intended to make the Staffordshire Hoard available for display to the public, but it is also intended to highlight the history and archaeology of the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia, which was centred on the area corresponding to the modern county of Staffordshire.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Mercian Trail” is group of museums and historical sites in the West Midlands. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Mercian, Trail and Group, not as a finished interpretation.
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The record creator and administrative purpose are central evidence, because official documentation reflects both action and institutional priorities. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 21, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q6818488. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1781, 2009 and 2010.
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This entry incorporates text from “Mercian Trail” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.