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Columbus is known as the man who "discovered" America while attempting to find a trade route to India, but this new find throws up a mystifying of undocumented settlers or expeditions by Spain.

The remarkable find was made in Glen Canyon National Recreation Area, Utah, where a hiker stumbled across two Spanish coins.

One of the coins may date back as far as the 1200s.

If its age is confirmed, the coin would have been minted 200 years before the explorer even reached the Americas and triggered mass colonisation by the Europeans.

Glen Harmon, an archaeologist of the national park service, described the find as "really exciting" and suggested it could point to undocumented settlers or expeditions from Spain.

Harmon said: "The coin – and we haven’t got a confirmation back on this yet – looks like it might be something dating from the mid-to-late 13th-century.

It’s a mystery as to how such an old coin could have ended up in an area that wasn’t visited by Spanish explorers until 1776.

He added: "I’m thinking that there’s basically three ways these coins could have gotten to where they were.

"One is that they were in fact deposited there by early Spanish settlers or explorers.

“If that’s the case, that’s really exciting because there is not a lot of good documentation of the early Spanish anywhere in that area."

(Image: GETTY)

(Image: PENN NEWS)

“The earliest Spanish presence in the Glen Canyon area is 1776 when [Father Atanasio] Dominguez and [Father Silvestre Velez de] Escalante came through," he went on.

“But they were nowhere near the area where these coins were found, that we know of.”

He continued: “Does this point to an early Spanish presence that is unknown or really poorly documented? That’s one possibility.

“And if that’s true, that’s really fantastic. That’s something new that we just didn’t know.”

(Image: PENN NEWS) (Image: PENN NEWS)

He explained there’s also the possibility that the coins were traded to a native American and then, either by travel or further trade, they came to the Glen Canyon area.

And he added there’s even a chance that the coins were left by a modern visitor.

The archaeologist is reluctant to endorse any one theory at this stage, but believes the smaller and potentially older coin would have crossed the Atlantic long after it was minted.

“If that really is a 13th-century coin, that does not indicate 13th-century Spanish were over here,” he said.

(Image: GETTY)

And if there was some forgotten Spanish expedition into the area, that only deepens the mystery.

Harmon said: “We always think of 1776, when Escalante and Dominguez came through on their attempt to get from Santa Fe to California, and came back having not made it to California.

“After that time period it’s really not until the 19th-century that European-Americans are showing up in this area.

“So if there’s other Spanish showing up here either before or after Escalante and Dominguez, that is exciting. Where did they come from, what were they doing here?

“That’s a really hard question to answer.”

(Image: PENN NEWS)

The coins were found near the Halls Crossing Marina on Lake Powell, however park officials are keeping the exact location secret until they can check there for more undiscovered artifacts.

Harmon warned would-be treasure hunters to stay away.

“We are going to be going out and taking a look at where these coins were recovered when the visitor found them to see if we can get any hints or clues about their history,” he said.

“Obviously a discovery like this draws a lot of attention and one thing we would like to reiterate is our concern that this might encourage people to come here with metal detectors and start looking for more things.

“In fact that is prohibited within this national park.”