Antiques Roadshow viewers were sickened by one of the guest’s antiques as she brought in some rather strange jewellery made on the Halloween night’s show.
The BBC Two programme aired on October 31 – with fans already in a spooky mood – highlighting the fact one of the guest’s items were freaking them out.
A lady brought on three items – a mourning ring, a brooch and a bracelet, all of which had a possible eerie twist to them.
The woman began: “I saw a ring on the internet, which I didn’t know what it was, but I thought it anyway for £5.99 I got it home and I found out that it was a mourning ring.”
(Image: BBC)
A mourning ring is worn in memory of someone who has died. It often bears the name and date of death of the person.
The antique expert then moved on to the eye-decorated item, which looked like it could have also been a mourning jewel from an initial glance.
He said: “It’s possible that this is the look of somebody beyond the grave but I rather suspect that this could be a love jewel and then the other thing is that it’s surrounded by pearls which do come into mourning jewellery, but in fact, they’re more often associated with love jewellery because they’re born of the shell like Venus herself.
(Image: BBC)
“If it is a love jewel, then mourning jewels of love beyond the grave were from a time when photography was almost non-existent. So there was a sort of terror of not remembering people because even remembering their faces, so the next way of doing it is to actually take part of them, which is to take the hair.”
The camera then panned down to a shot of the bracelet which had a lock of somebody’s hair in the centre.
The woman then interjected: “That’s how I actually started to collect because the hair survives death. It doesn’t rot, though. So it’s quite an intricate task to actually get that plaited like that.”
(Image: BBC)
He then continued: “And frankly it’s quite macabre, isn’t it? It doesn’t really sit in with modern times, and nobody necessarily wants to touch the hair of the dead but that’s exactly what we’re doing.
“So the interesting thing about this concept taking hair from the dead and reworking it into jewellery is a very, very ancient one indeed. And then it cascades all the way down to the 19th century and then suddenly, everybody thinks it’s absolutely repellent.”
(Image: BBC)
Viewers took to Twitter to comment on the revelations, with one saying: “Hair from the dead, no thanks. #AntiquesRoadshow”
A second penned: “Haunted jewellery #antiquesroadshow”
A third typed: “Love Jewel is bloody hideous #antiquesroadshow”
A fourth mentioned: “That broach, giving the eye [sic] #antiquesroadshow”
And a fifth put: “Hair of the dead. I think I could make a series @netflix would be interested in #antiquesroadshow”
Despite hoping to cash in for her items, the expert burst her bubble and revealed that they weren’t worth a huge amount.
He said: “Well, they’re strange things. They’re very magical things. And so you have love and love beyond the grave and this is stunning stuff and very emotional, and curiously enough, not hugely valuable.”
Source: Celebrities - dailystar.co.uk
