Renishaw Hall Antiques Roadshow

You've heard of Middle England,

well, today the Roadshow has arrived at the geographical centre of the United Kingdom.

Stick a pin at a spot between Sheffield and Chesterfield and you will find Renishaw Hall, Derbyshire,

home to the Sitwell family.

The hall was built with nails, or rather with the fortune made in the 17th century

by the Sitwells whose iron foundries turned out more nails than anywhere else in the world.

Renishaw has been the abode of the Sitwell dynasty for over 350 years.

In the 18th century, Squire Sitwell Sitwell

got down to the business of spending the family fortune.

He enhanced the original manor house by adding two wings.

He built the classically styled stable block to house his horses and a pack of harriers.

Once, the hounds were sent to catch two Bengal tigers that had escaped from a menagerie in Sheffield.

Sitwell Sitwell's other building works included the dining room,

incorporating a cock-fighting ring,

the vast drawing room

and this magnificent ballroom.

The first ball was held in honour of the Prince of Wales.

The royal guest's thank-you card came in the form of a baronetcy for his host.

Subsequent Sitwells, Sir George and Sir Reresby, dedicated themselves to the pleasures of spending,

so that when Sir Reresby died in 1862,

his two-year-old son George's inheritance consisted of the title and an empty house.

Sir George was a quirky lad with an offbeat sense of humour and a talent as an inventor.

Among his brainwaves were a toothbrush that played Annie Laurie and a revolver for shooting wasps.

He also had some ingenious plans for the house.

Fortunately, under the restraint of his friend Sir Edwin Lutyens, few of his ideas were realised.

An exception was Renishaw's gardens. Sir George made a serious study of the subject

and his designs created the classically styled gardens we see today.

Next time, we'll hear about Sir George's extraordinary children - Edith, Osbert and Sacheverell -

who made the Sitwells one of the most famous literary families of the 20th century.

Now, let's meet the people who have come for this week's Antiques Roadshow.

-Who is Hazel?

-Hazel is my elder sister by some 11 years. Mrs Froggatt is Hazel's mother.

The connection with Sir Osbert, who wrote the letter, is that my father was the head gardener at Renishaw

in the '40s through to the '50s.

Really? "My dear Mrs Froggatt, I've ordered the vaccine,

"but Hazel must only be given one quarter of one tube at a time. That's enough for a child of four."

I love this letter. It finishes off, "Send me the coupons at once." I assume they were for this stuff.

-Rationing was still...

-"Love to Hazel. Tell her Father Christmas is very tired this year.

"Yours, Osbert Sitwell". Another letter, from the Grand Hotel Palace, Locarno.

It says, "My dear Fred..." Your father. "How are ya and Mrs Froggatt and Hazel and Josephine?

"I hope well." Then he goes on, "Really, one feels so ashamed about our Government.

"Foreigners feel so bad for us, which I hate. Two years ago, we were a great nation with a future.

"Attlee, Shinwell and Co have accomplished

"more than Hitler did in five years of war, in two years of peace. Yours, OS."

That's rather nice. Tremendous. Then his writing here is becoming rather bad. What is happening here?

Sir Osbert suffered with Parkinson's disease for over 20 years of his later life

-and eventually he was unable to write any great amount.

-Yes.

"Could you note, no daffodils are to be cut until I come down,

"except a few to be sent here, and that I'd welcome some eggs and broccoli?"

-Why would he want broccoli?

-He obviously liked it, because he's underlined it.

-I hate broccoli.

-This is a wonderful collection. You've got 22 letters here?

-Yes, 22.

-From 1943 through to 1960.

-Right. Have you any idea of their value?

-Not a clue.

Well, he doesn't pull great amounts of money,

-but I think you've got roughly about £2,000 worth here. That's a very nice legacy.

-Yeah.

They're part of a collection put together by Clare's father in the early '60s.

I believe there are ten swords altogether. Swords and rapiers.

There are five daughters in the family and the collection's been broken down between them.

Your father was a man of good taste.

If we start with the earliest one, this wonderful rapier known as a Pappenheim.

A very long blade designed as a prodder rather than a cutting blade,

although you could cut with it.

Tremendously long, so that you got the advantage over any opponent.

Even so, it's tremendously, beautifully well-balanced.

-Named after Pappenheim, who was an Imperialist general in the Thirty Years' War.

-Right.

-He didn't make or invent them, he was associated with them.

-Yes.

-But they're very distinctive

and very sought-after by collectors.

And one is going to be £2,500 to £3,000.

So that's a very, very good start.

Very similar, and of about the same period, is this dagger,

-which is known as a left-hand dagger or "main gauche", which is French.

-Right.

-This would have been carried in that hand...

-Yes.

-..with the rapier in the other hand.

-Yes.

You would have been able to either block an opponent's blade with that or, if you got close up to them,

you could push right into them and give them one in the ribs with the dagger.

Or you could carry the dagger on its own when it would have been inconvenient to carry a sword.

Most men carried daggers up until the beginning of the English Civil War, so it was part of male dress.

-This, I believe, is a Victorian version of it.

-Right.

The Victorians produced lots of good-quality arms and armour

to decorate all the castles and country houses, because there wasn't enough of the real thing.

-It's still worth £400 to £500.

-Right.

-So, if we move on from the 17th century to the 18th...

-J'accuse!

-Right.

-You are a burglar.

-No.

When I left home yesterday, THAT was in my kitchen over the Aga,

absolutely identical, apart from the fact mine's got the tail.

-The tail.

-Where did you get yours?

My grandfather had it in a shed, oh, going back...must be 30... 30-odd years ago,

-two old clocks just sitting in the corner.

-Really?

-And I was offered whichever one I wanted.

-And you chose this one?

-Yes, and it's just been sat in a cupboard most of the time.

-Well, I love mine.

It's wonderful. It's majolica ware. But not English majolica ware.

This is French. It's either Longwy or Bordeaux. I don't know which.

And it dates from the same period as the English majolica, about 1870-75, somewhere around there.

I don't know if yours is the same. Mine is extremely well-fitting...

-You have to lever this off with a knife to get into it. I got sick of doing that.

-Right.

It's an eight-day movement, so what I've done - terrible thing, don't tell the clock people -

what I've done is to take the movement out and put in a quartz movement.

I've kept the original, so if ever I pass it on, or die or whatever, the movement's there.

I love this brilliant blue.

I think it'd make £600 to £1,000.

-Nice shed buy, wasn't it, really?

-Was really, wasn't it?

These swords are also known as claymores. Claymore is the Gaelic word for "great sword".

-It's generally applied to these huge, two-handed swords.

-Yes.

This basket's very distinctive and it protects the hand.

And it's also a very useful knuckle-duster.

That will have been made in either Glasgow or Edinburgh, in about 1780-1800,

-so that's right at the beginning of the Napoleonic Wars.

-Right.

-And that's worth about £2,000.

-Right.

But this absolutely splendid sword,

made for a heavy dragoon officer...

-Right.

-..and...

Actually, wonderfully dated - 1788.

It's very typical of swords that were carried in the American War of Independence - that was earlier -

and typical of swords between the American War of Independence and the Napoleonic Wars.

-And the grip, do you know what that's made of?

-No.

-It's fish skin.

-Oh, is it?

-Really?

-Yes.

The skin of a shark or a giant ray.

And it enables you, if your hand is either sweaty or bloody or even wet, to really get a good grip of it.

And it would have originally been wrapped with wire round there just to keep it all on.

-I think a sword as good as this, in such good condition, is worth between £4,000 to £5,000.

-Right.

A lovely pigeon fancier's clock.

-My grandfather did race pigeons.

-Did he?

-Yes.

-What sort of date would that have been?

-I would say the 1930s.

-Right. It's a Turner's Patent model.

Although there is another patent number on the top by Hattley.

There are three dials at the top, from 1 to 24. Their hands are missing,

-which is unfortunate.

-Yes.

-And then you've got a normal dial underneath.

It's called a "homing pigeon" clock.

Inside, if you were to take the back off, you'd see there is a key-wind movement with a lever platform.

-Yes.

-Also in there is a paper disc.

The pigeons are all released from the loft, however many miles away,

and they hopefully come back to you, as the handler. As your pigeon arrives,

you take off its leg what they used to call a thimble, which contained the identification of that pigeon.

-You popped it into one of these holes here.

-Yes.

-As it went into that hole, it caused a little mark to be made on the paper disk.

-Oh.

Every single piece of this clock is numbered, and that is because it was taken very seriously.

Even the inside bits are numbered.

They didn't want a situation where an unscrupulous pigeon fancier could just whip on a different back.

-As a sort of rural antique, it's great.

-Yes.

If it came up at auction, somebody would pay £500 for it, maybe a bit more, because the condition is good.

In the 1880s, everybody was trying to grab power in Africa.

This commemorates one bit of it, when Stanley went across Africa.

During his trip, I think he bumped into Livingstone.

I've never seen anything like it. I think it's extremely rare.

I can only hazard a guess...

£300, I think, is probably what it's worth.

Oh, that's more than I thought.

-Do you have no involvement with the exploration of Africa?

-No.

About the same date are these two claret jugs. Stanley could have used either of these!

This one is Doulton, in Lambeth in London, particularly interesting in being marked by George Tinworth.

He specialised in doing little models of frogs and little animals.

He was a great modeller.

He would have designed and made most of that jug. It's wonderful.

Isn't it funny he put his mark slap in the middle of the decoration? Yes.

-No respect for his own work. Had you noticed that before?

-No.

There's the key thing to the pot.

THIS jug is made by Royal Worcester. It's a claret jug again, 1892.

It's got a Sheffield hallmark.

So we're looking at, for the Royal Worcester jug, something like £500 or £600.

-It's a good, good pot.

-Oh.

-And for the Doulton pot by Tinworth -

unfortunately a little bit damaged, but a splendid pot -

-we must be looking at £400, £500.

-My granny kept string in it.

-Did she, indeed?!

A few years ago, my daughter and I used to go on holiday to a cottage in Barnard Castle.

-Every night, we'd go down to the River Tees and beachcomb, or RIVER-comb!

-Yes.

-We were picking wood up to burn. I kicked this piece of wood over and this was on the other side.

-No!

That is an amazing story, because it's a rather wonderful picture. I guess that's why this area here...

-is rather faded and damaged.

-Yes.

-That must be water damage.

-Yes.

-But it's amazing that all this area survived so beautifully.

-Yes.

-I wonder how long it had been in the river.

-Probably a long time.

-Yes.

-It's on wood...

-It's on panel.

-..which I don't know much about.

-Well, if you look at the back...

-It's actually rather beautiful. You see this sort of chamfering here?

-Yes.

That's an indication it was on a great piece of panelling.

The wood panellist would have shaped this bit down to put in the frame,

so it fitted nicely in the frame. But this side has not been shaved.

-It looks like it's been split.

-Yes.

-And I guess...that, either in the river, or perhaps it was broken by the original owner...

-Yes.

..and they chucked this top bit away. It might have been this size. This is an amazing find.

I guess, by looking at it, it's Dutch.

Um...it's, I would say, almost certainly 19th-century. It's a pity it's not signed.

It's like an artist called JC Schotel, who painted these sort of landscapes.

They're copying the 17th century, but there was still a huge tradition in the 19th century of seascapes.

If this came on the market, we would say £300 to £500, £400 to £600.

-Oh! Well, not bad...

-No.

-Not bad for an evening's work,

-getting driftwood.

-Amazing!

-I've been back - there's nothing there.

-These are recipe books, dating back to 1908.

-I'm not actually very good at cooking.

What are they? Sweetmeats?

No, for steel, Sheffield being famous for steel. These belonged to my grandfather in the 1900s.

Each steelwork would have had its own secret recipe

that they wouldn't have wanted other steelworks to know.

This recipe, for instance, for CTVC - whatever that is -

had 14lb of DGL, 10lb of OAK,

15lb of CTVC scrap, 2lb of ferrous chrome and 2¾oz of charcoal.

I believe, with the chrome, it's possibly part of stainless steel.

I've got a photograph of him here pouring the smelted steel from a red-hot crucible.

They had to be quite fit to do that, because each crucible weighed up to 40lb or 50lb.

-He'd have known the secret of all these books?

-Yes. He's taken the secret to his grave. Possibly not!

My mother bought it in the early '60s. The story that she tells

is that she was driving through a village

and saw one half of it being off-loaded off a truck outside an antique shop.

She stopped and said, having looked at it,

"I'll have it, so don't bother to take the other bit off".

-No need to unload.

-Yes.

-Brilliant. And it's been there ever since?

-Until she died,

-when my wife and I inherited it.

-It's a typical late Georgian form,

made throughout the 18th century and into the early 19th century.

But there are certain stylistic, unusual elements which perhaps pin it down a little bit closer.

One of them is this pierced, waved cornice, which is rather quirky.

Perhaps a provincial craftsman enjoying himself in making various things.

-And you've also got these unusual things - where you've got mahogany used as the cross-banding wood.

-Mm.

So, although they've used incredibly good oak with very visible medullary rays -

these white streaks are called medullary rays, and they're very visible throughout it -

they've then used a mahogany cross-banding, which is quite an expensive, exotic timber to use.

It also has these very quirky, stylised floral patera,

which is the sort of thing you see particularly on furniture made in the West Midlands.

And, again, this amazing, exaggerated wave apron,

with these very idiosyncratic cabriole legs with the pointed pad feet. They're so overblown!

-Aren't they just?!

-They're great.

I needed to pack this drawer up. This top moulding had broken off.

I actually had to use some Formica.

I know that's a horrible term to use with an antique!

-But the drawer now slides an awful lot better.

-Slides very easily.

It's full of telephone directories, and it slides a lot more easily than it did.

-Do you know how much she paid for it?

-£70.

-£70?

-Yes.

If you were to try and replace it now, you would probably have to spend in the region of £3,500.

-Oh, that's good.

-It's lovely.

I was given it by a friend of mine

who had to move into a home recently. She asked if I'd like it.

The shells are modelled from real shells. They would have made a plaster mould from real shells,

then made the shells and put them onto this little rocky base.

And here there's the mark of Chamberlain's, Worcester,

-which proves that it dates around the 1840s.

-Uh-huh.

-1840-1845.

At that time Chamberlain's factory were terribly interested in shells.

They were very popular things.

They used them to mount round frames of pictures, and scenes, and pots, and all sorts of things.

-They almost look like seaside souvenirs, you know, you get from Brighton...

-Yes, yes.

..modelled with real shells all the way round, but here fantastically beautiful porcelain shells.

They're delightful.

And shells in the end of the 18th century, early 19th century, were incredibly popular.

-They used to pay an enormous amount of money...

-Really?

..for a new shell discovered in the Red Sea or the Far East.

So this reflects this great craze with shells.

And they're beautifully done. You expect to see little crabs crawling out from under here!

What are the little red things?

They're little berries you get in the sea, seaweed berries.

-And nicely gilded. It's just had a little bit of damage, hasn't it?

-Just a little bit, I think, yes.

Just a little chip there, not too bad.

But that big shell is fantastic

and these cone shells are gorgeous.

-Everything done by hand.

-Really?

A gorgeously lovely thing

and, although damaged, it's still a very desirable object.

-Do you want to know the value? Of course, the value is immaterial as it was a gift.

-Exactly.

-But...

-say...£400 to £500.

-Oh, my goodness!

-Which is very nice.

-Thank you. I had no idea.

It's been in the family since the First World War, when Great Uncle Eric brought it back from Germany.

This was made by Bing, who was the greatest train maker of that period,

-Gebruder Bing, of Nuremberg.

-Yes.

One of the earliest British manufacturers, initially retailers, was a company called Bassett-Lowke,

-who you've probably heard of.

-Yes.

-Initially Bassett-Lowke were simply retailers selling German trains.

What they, and others, got Bing to do was to make trains that were specifically for the British market.

Previously, you bought vehicles that were obviously German and nobody minded.

There was no sense of reality. But as the habit of having toy trains became quite widespread,

people began to say, "Why have we got German trains? We want British trains."

So here is a live steam locomotive,

London North Western Railway,

about 1902, 1905, 1906, that sort of date.

Then we have a range of vehicles of a similar date,

which are in a sense a random assortment.

We've got a fish van, this very nice car carrier,

a covered wagon which has lost its roof, and then an open wagon for the Great Northern Railway.

-This is a set that was in Britain long before the First World War, 1906, 1908.

-OK.

Maybe he acquired it second-hand before, during or after the First World War.

-The rarity is this. You probably knew that?

-I thought so.

-Why?

-Well, I've never seen anything like it.

That's the piece that any collector would - not quite die for - but would be VERY keen.

You can imagine what's happened - the chains have got broken, somebody playing with it,

they didn't bother to put it back together again. This becomes a toy car, that becomes part of a railway.

Here, they're still united.

Everything was made for the complete railway, before anybody significant in Britain was in the business.

Bassett-Lowke then got going and, of course, in the early '20s, Frank Hornby starts his Hornby Trains.

But he's the first mass-manufacturer for the British market. What's it worth?

That one in that condition

is probably, to a collector, about £100 to £150. The fish van,

which is unusual and again in very nice, virtually unplayed-with condition, I'd say £150 to £200.

Let's deal with the locomotive, worn, inevitably, through the firing

but still a very nice, detailed model, possibly retailed by an English company.

I'm going to say £800 for the locomotive. Now let's come to THAT.

In relative terms, that is a very rare wagon,

so I'm going to say about £300 to £500 for that, simply because it is such a rarity.

-But it means that altogether you've got getting on for £1,800 to £2,000.

-Yes, a good investment, then.

-She must have been given these by Edward Seago?

-Yes, Edward apparently gave this painting,

somewhere in Scotland, as a gift,

-with the picture of the pixies, then drew these in her autograph book.

-Before the war?

-Mm.

-How lovely!

Through his childhood he was often bedridden and took to drawing rather against his parents' wishes.

They didn't encourage him, as far as I can understand.

But he developed a tremendous talent for, in this case, nice little sketches and caricatures.

I think it's nice that, although you've got this oil painting, which most people will be familiar with -

Seago's best known to the public for his marvellously worked-up oils and watercolours in the post-war era -

you have these beautifully-observed caricatures. Now, after 1939, Seago goes off to the war

and paints, not as an official war artist, but produced paintings which essentially established his name.

I don't know that they're of enormous value, but sentiment in this case is everything.

An oil like that, without a signature but with a nice story and proven provenance

-would be worth about £500, £600, I suppose.

-Really?

-And each of these sketches,

which I think are in a way nicer than the oil, are probably worth £300 or £400 each.

-To me, they're priceless.

-Exactly.

This cresting here is completely wrong.

I think it's been made specifically to go on this chair, to replace an earlier cresting.

-The other one might have been broken, damaged or lost or simply offended whoever it was.

-Yes.

A lot of this period oak furniture

was carved up in the 19th century,

and this type of carving is certainly second half of the 19th century, possibly even 1880-1900.

There were clubs of... You know, people would go to evening class to learn about carving.

This is certainly amateur.

So, whether somebody replaced it because they preferred that...

The iconography's lost. The cresting means not a lot to me.

It's a mad-looking man. Was it bought in this part of the country?

-Sheffield saleroom, yes.

-Right. There's something about this back,

certainly this panelled back, and the marquetry is more typical of Yorkshire, specifically Leeds.

-When you think that this chair is middle of the 17th century, 1640-60, that sort of date.

-Right.

Leeds was one of the wealthiest towns in the country outside London,

and the opportunity to build an important joiner's chair in oak.

And they favoured marquetry. You can see how thick it is where this piece is missing,

and probably mother-of-pearl there, by the look of it. And it's of tulips.

Tulips at this time were very valuable.

Whole estates were wagered and lost on the price of a tulip bulb.

When the tulip crash came, many people were ruined. One tulip bulb was worth thousands of pounds.

So that's part of the aesthetics of this period.

With the cresting later, when you look at these teeth mouldings, as they're called,

this shiny colour here is not 17th-century.

-I suspect they've all been replaced.

-It did have some restoration work done on it about ten years ago,

because this was dragged here and there for children's parties, and lots of these fell out.

-What do children do at a party on this?

-They sit on it. The birthday person at the head of the table.

How lovely! There's lots of wear on the arm, nice, genuine wear. Genuine 17th-century arm.

And very nice decoration down here.

The front and the sides have got this nice lunette, incised carving,

which is all perfectly period and genuine. It often has been copied in the 19th century.

But this is all perfectly genuine in my opinion. The problem is value.

Dramatically altered, I'm afraid, by the back.

If that cresting was right, I can see that in a shop for £4,000, possibly even more.

-But the cresting has made a huge difference to the value.

-Yes.

-£1,000 might be more realistic.

-Yes.

-Because of that alteration.

-Yes.

It's so exciting to see, not only a coverlet that is just so intricate and so beautifully made,

but the colours are still so wonderful. Where have you kept it?

Well, I keep it in pure cotton sheets

and I open it frequently,

because if it's creased in the same place regularly, it will break the fabric.

-You're absolutely right. Do you roll it?

-Sometimes I roll it instead of folding.

Apart from the fact that it's all in such brilliant colour and condition,

-the fact that it's still got the tacking cotton on it!

-That's true.

I'm pleased that I can see it as it was left.

-Yes.

-And I believe it's two or three generations who had a go at completing it.

-I'm going on the fabrics that... some seem to be becoming more modern.

-Yes.

-Some older.

-Some much older. So I think there is a lot of history here.

I found the templates mention London quite a lot.

I think the templates are mainly London newspapers.

I think this design is the Grandmother's Garden design.

These diamonds are meant to be flowers and these, flower beds.

We've got a flower there and there.

And these are the paths, these white areas.

-And this, I believe, is calico.

-It looks like it, doesn't it?

-Do you think?

-Yes.

-I think we're talking about the middle of the 19th century.

-Yes.

Oh, look, I've got something here.

This one goes back to..."July 13th 18..." and then it's..."4"...

-and then it's cut off. So, it's 184..., say 1840.

-Yes.

-So...

one can assume that they were doing it in the mid-19th century

and maybe finished it in the late 19th century. Maybe it just took a very long time.

-Well, I would estimate there are about 2,500 pieces.

-Really?

-I think so.

-Because it's a double one, isn't it?

-Yes, it's about 108 inches by 98.

-If you insured it...

-Yes.

-I think you'd have to insure it for £2,000.

-Really?

-Thank you for coming in.

This is one of the most intriguing 19th-century watches I've ever seen.

-It is absolutely massive.

-Isn't it?

I can't believe it was ever worn. How did you get hold of it?

It was handed down from my mother's side of the family. It belonged to her parents.

I do remember that at the time, particularly during the War,

they owned a public house, and it was subject to numerous wagers regarding its weight.

-Tell me how much it weighs.

-It weighs 3lb 10oz. A little bit heavy to put on a chain.

-Well, you would have to have very deep pockets.

-Or strong braces.

You've had it out occasionally, because there's a bit of damage to the dial, which is a great shame.

-The minute hand and second hand have been changed. The hour hand's original.

-OK.

Let's crack into it, because it is such a weighty piece...

And you've got a lovely, lovely dust cap here.

-I often wondered how that came off.

-Just roll it over to see the maker's name.

"Jackson, Maker of Tunstall."

You can see the fusee and chain.

-Oh, that's the chain?

-Yes. They were made by a female workforce

-on the south coast of England.

-It's a very small link.

-Tiny.

The lever is what you'd expect.

It has a brass three-arm balance.

So, mechanically, it's typical state of the art.

-And that hallmark in there, London, 1864.

-1864, is it really?

-Yes.

It's a pretty old piece, for something like this.

I have NO idea why anybody would have ordered a watch of this size.

I was always of the opinion that it was probably made for exhibition in a jeweller's window.

It's a possibility.

A little repair to the enamel, not a lot of money, replacement of those two hands...

-I would have thought at auction, I could see it making £2,000.

-Really?

-Yes. It's so unusual.

This is a lovely piece of local history. A very old map, going back to 1723. Is it yours?

Well, it belongs to the family.

It is a map of the Rodes Estate, in Barlborough. We're a Barlborough family.

We knew of this map for many years.

The person who owned it was willing to sell, so my brother, who wanted to keep everything in the village,

made an offer which they accepted.

My brother's died, but he's left it to my sister and myself to take care of it.

And do you feature as a family?

Yes, there is our...our name, which is Machin.

-"William Machin."

-Yes.

A book would go with it, which unfortunately we haven't got,

-which is a shame.

-And that's got where the treasure is buried, I expect.

-Well, we could do with it!

I think that's great.

The head is porcelain, almost certainly German.

But I think she could have been assembled in France.

France were very keen on automata.

This one might have been a French construction. I love that action!

A wooden base...

with a paper panel inset here...

..little steel wheels...

It's dating from the 1890s. Today, it would have a value of around...

-..£400 to £600.

-Oh, lovely.

I swapped it at an antique arcade for a silver dog-head cane handle.

-You're still quite happy with your swap though, are you?

-Yes.

These were used for sealing documents in the days... This was in the days before stamps even!

Your envelope was part of the letter. You got your sealing wax

and did that.

So you knew who the letter was from by the seal.

This one is 1780, around there,

so it is an early one.

Unusual, because we've got a man who's in a cap with a tassel.

That kind of cap and tassel was worn either by artists, or actors, or literary people.

And then we've got a curious mask on this side...

of, I don't know, tragedy or something like that.

-Yes, I'd wondered whether it was something like comedy and tragedy.

-It isn't.

-It isn't?

-No.

It looks a bit French to me,

and I'm wondering whether it's somebody like Diderot or one of the French writers.

-They had him with a hat sometimes.

-They did.

But it could be even Hogarth. He's another possibility, could be English.

Very nice thing.

I think your swap with your dog-headed cane was right.

-I think it would fetch somewhere in the region of £400 to £600.

-Great.

-Lovely.

-Yes, I like the piece.

-Star of your collection.

-Good.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank YOU.

-Which of you is the Japanese freak who collects all these things?

-Me.

-..And you approve of this?

-I do, because I know exactly what to buy him for Christmas and birthdays.

-Did you start by buying that one?

-Yes. I got that when I were 15,

in a market for... I paid £1.

Well, you did probably all right paying £1 for that,

but size in this class of Japanese Satsuma ware -

second half of the 19th century - isn't necessarily a virtue.

Right.

In terms of quality, these small ones,

which have much finer decoration,

-are much better in terms of quality and actually better in terms of value.

-Right.

This, which represents Gama-Sennin, who was a great Japanese immortal,

dates from the same period, the last quarter of the century.

Now, I see at one time it was in France, and there's a long label here.

"Satsuma", that's right.

"Japan, dynasty Edo or Tokugawa, 1603-1867."

-I think it's slightly later than that.

-Right.

-It's probably about 1880.

It's quite an impressive lump, this piece.

-If you were to sell that today, you'd probably only get £400 or £500.

-Right, right.

Whereas THIS...

is, to my mind, a most beautiful and unusual piece.

Most of these things are what we call...what the Japanese served up to the European market.

No self-respecting Japanese would have bought this for his own home.

But he WOULD have bought something like this.

And this is the kind of Japanese art that had an immense influence in Western Europe,

-on people like Whistler...

-Oh.

-..and the French artists.

This gave rise to "Japonaiserie" in the 1870s and 1880s.

You see it at Minton, all over the English ceramic factories.

This is, to my mind, a really beautiful object. Where did you find it?

-I bought it him for Christmas.

-My wife.

-And did you...?

-He's not listening - did you have to pay a lot of money for it?

-No...

-Am I allowed to say?

-Yes.

-I paid about £200 for that.

-Well...

Gosh!

I think you've got a real steal there. It should be worth a lot of money.

In fact, it's probably only worth £500 or £600. I think it should be worth more and will be.

But I think you did awfully well. In buying this, you bought a real gem.

I'm so excited to see it,

because it's completely different from this.

-THIS is a star object. Find some more like that. Let HER go out and find it.

-Yes.

-Probably a lot better.

-I'll choose in future.

-Particularly when she's paying with HER money.

-Correct.

-Have you had it for many years?

-Yes, from 1964.

It was bought at an auction. It was the first thing my husband saw when he walked into the place.

-He said, "I'd love that, but I won't be able to buy it".

-Oh, right. And?

-So...

-when the auctioneer said, "We'll start at one pound ten shillings", nobody put their hand up.

-Right.

And it was quite a while, so my husband put his hand up and we got it.

Brilliant!

-Do you know who it's by?

-Yes, EJ Smythe.

-Right.

-I think it absolutely is a member of the Smythe family who painted this.

-Yes.

-If you look carefully here...

..you can make out the signature. I think it's ER, Edward Robert Smythe.

-We couldn't quite see the middle one.

-He was a good 19th-century artist -

his quite famous brother was Thomas Smythe -

and he specialised in paintings of animals and landscapes.

What is interesting about the time, 1850-1860, when this was probably painted,

-was that zoos were building up...

-Yes.

-..people were becoming rather interested in exotica.

-Yes.

-And they were fed up with the portraits of horses and dogs and went for the more exotic animals.

He's a rather friendly-looking lion.

-The eyes and the fur, so beautifully done.

-Everybody remarks on the eyes.

-Yes.

-Yes.

It's a very imposing picture, very unusual format.

We have a few condition problems on it. It's received a knock here.

-My grandchildren walking along the hall.

-I don't think we can blame your grandchildren for this.

-No, this is deteriorating over the last few years.

-It's not serious.

-But it is the paint flaking off.

-Yes.

-If any more comes off, it's going to be a worry.

-But we'd all be flaking a bit if we were around 1860, wouldn't we?

-I am.

Nonsense! It's a wonderful portrait.

It's full of life and got great quality

-and, you know, Smythe's works are collected.

-Yes.

-I would say something like this should be insured for around £5,000.

-Yes.

-So quite a good investment from your one pound ten shillings you paid in 1964.

-Yes, that's true.

-But it's a wonderful, wonderful thing, and I hope you'll enjoy it for many years.

-Oh, I shall.

-Good.

-Thank you for showing it to us.

-Thank you.

That's it for this Antiques Roadshow.

Next time, I shall tell you more about the colourful characters of the Sitwell family

and we'll see more treasures from the people of Derbyshire.

If you're interested in antiques, you can go to our website.

But for now, from Renishaw Hall, goodbye.