AS all good metal detectorists know, it’s not just worms and terrible secrets that live underground; there’s a veritable treasure trove of rare and precious metals and priceless historic artefacts just waiting to be discovered by the plucky and persistent soul.

Take the exquisite Roman drinking vessel that was found near Abergavenny in 2003 and has since become known to the wider world as The Leopard Cup due to its decretive handle, which, you guessed it, is shaped like a leopard.

The Leopard Cup
What kind of cool cat drank out of a cup like this? (Abergavenny Chronicle )

Discovered by Mr Gary Mapps and reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme, the cup was manufactured to a very high standard in Italy during the 1st century AD.

It currently sits in St Fagans National Museum of History being admired daily, but for hundreds, if not thousands of years it lay buried beneath he soil, out of sight and out of mind, just waiting for the day it would be discovered and celebrated again.

Which begs the question: what else lies beneath fair Abergavenny?

What curiosities have the Celts, Romans, Saxons, Normans, and backpackers from Kent left in their wake?

Well, amongst the humdrum collection of coins, arrowheads, rings, and ring can pulls, now and then, something a little special is plucked from the ground’s earthly embrace.

Such as an antique supermarket trolley.

Just check out this beauty!

An abandoned trolley
Conceptual art isn't everyone's cup of culture! (Abergavenny Chronicle )

Its aesthetic cage-like design and functional yet sublime form has been enhanced by a unique coating of rust that has formed after years of the trolley sitting beneath the ground, or perhaps submerged in the River Usk itself.

After being unearthed or plucked from the river, the trolley was paraded in pride of place at the Mill Street entrance to Castle Meadows.

This enabled visitors to enjoy the rare find before it was carefully removed by experts in white gloves to a museum for safekeeping and posterity.

The Romans may have had the Leopard Cup, but future generations will look back at our modern times with awe because we had the supermarket trolley.

And as John Keats once so rightly said, “A thing of beauty is a joy forever.”