New mystery surrounds treasure

The Great Dish is kept at the British Museum

A second piece of the world-famous Mildenhall Treasure may be missing it has been revealed - days after a silver goblet was unaccounted for.

Experts at the British Museum who examined a photograph of the hoard of Roman silver said there appears to be an item not recorded.

The photograph, taken between 1942 and 1946, was unearthed by the BBC documentary Meet the Ancestors.

JD Hill, a curator at the British Museum, said when he saw the photograph he was surprised to see an item he had not seen before.

An artists impression of the missing goblet

"That picture appears to show an object not accounted for," he said.

"There is a bottom of a vessel. It would be nice if the item turned up as it would complete the picture."

The hoard is believed to have been found by ploughman Gordon Butcher, on land in West Row, near Mildenhall, Suffolk, in 1942.

Missing goblet

Earlier this month it was revealed that a 94-year-old from Suffolk remembered cleaning a Roman goblet which had been part of the hoard, but was not in the British Museum collection.

Dr Colin Dring, of the Mildenhall Museum, told BBC News Online how Jack Thompson had often talked to him about how he had cleaned the goblet.

Dr Dring said Mr Thompson only realised the goblet that he had handled was missing when he was taken to see the set of replicas at the Mildenhall Museum.

"I had always assumed he was talking about one of the two goblets in the treasure," he said.

"We brought it down for him to see piece by piece, including the two goblets, and he said, 'where's the one I worked on.' And it wasn't there."

Mr Thompson told him the missing silver goblet was five inches high with intricate decoration and four legs.