About This Artifact
A lead bag seal consisting of two lead circles stamped together, recovered on Lot 5 during Season 11 near the deliberately buried round stone foundation. Rick Lagina and Gary Drayton found the piece while scanning the area around the circular feature. Gary initially believed it was an old coin before Laird Niven identified it as a bag seal at the Interpretive Centre.
Emma Culligan's XRF analysis revealed the seal is primarily lead with some iron impurities and a trace of copper. The front surface bears several stamped letters, including what appeared to be a "k," "e," and "r." Laird found an exact match in historical records: a "J. Lloyd Packers London" cloth packers seal listed as army packers, establishing a direct military connection to the artifact. He dated the seal to the 1700s but noted it could be older based on the use of an "I" in place of a "J," a lettering convention that changed around 1524. Army packers seals were attached to cloth bales and supply shipments destined for military forces, indicating that military provisions passed through or were stored on Oak Island.
The Lloyd seal was the second bag seal found on Oak Island. A similar seal had been recovered on Lot 32 three years earlier, and testing of that seal's lead composition showed it was a match to both the 14th-century lead barter token from Lot 5 and the 14th-century lead cross Rick and Gary found at Smith's Cove in 2017. The new seal's lead composition did not match the Lot 32 example, suggesting multiple sources of lead artifacts reached the island through different channels or periods.
Historical Context
Laird Niven; The Curse of Oak Island Season 11 Episode 5
Where It Was Found
Found at Lot 5 — Oak Island, Nova Scotia, Canada.
