Oxford Flog It!

And it boasts 39 colleges, including this one, Christchurch,

which is right opposite our venue for today - Oxford Town Hall.

The good and the great have been educated at Oxford.

Just listen to this for an impressive list.

But our two experts who are going to use their knowledge

and educate the good people of Oxford on antiques

Not a lot. It has been sitting in my cabinet for years.

So it has been passed down through the family? Yes.

And is there any foreign connection in your family?

My husband looked on the Internet for this and I believe it's French.

That's right. I understand you've done a little bit of research on it

and you have come up with the name of the French firm, Christofle,

Now, those marks under the foot I know can sometimes be misleading.

They can lead you to suspect that the mounts on this jug are silver.

Obviously that's going to affect on the value.

It's crisply moulded. It's decorative.

You've got these fine sort of scrolling acanthus moulded handle.

And the glass itself - I think the firm and Baccarat perhaps had a kind

of connection there, so this could well be a Baccarat crystal glass.

Another good quality high-end French maker of glass.

But back to this piece. It's a jug, obviously.

And I suspect perhaps a claret jug, to decant red wine into.

Have you had it valued? I know you did some research.

So it didn't put a price so we have no idea.

Because it is silver plate we're going to have to bear that in mind.

Would you be happy with that? That sounds fair. OK.

If we try it in the auction, we will put an estimate of 100-150.

we might have some French wine drinkers in the saleroom.

Fingers crossed. And we will sell it for you.

Hello, Rosalind. Hello, Mark. Nice to see you here in Oxford.

I moved into my house in Oxford in 1991

and there were several interesting things in the house when I moved in.

This was one of them and it reminded me of the days when we had a pub

So you had a little shop attached? A little shop attached to the pub.

You could do your shopping... And have a beer?

And have a beer at the same time. That is a very canny idea, isn't it?

Wonderful, yes. And what did you used to call these?

Because of the five bars of chocolate. Yes, yes.

Wonderful. Basically, what we've got is an advertising piece.

And you've also got a name. It was obviously given as a gift, in 1894.

Yes. So it is actually quite an early piece of Fry's memorabilia,

Have you any idea of what it might be worth?

is it worth anything or not? I think it is worth something.

I would have thought it's only around ?30-?40 but who knows?

In auction, it might go for a bit more. Are you happy to put it in?

And let's hope that, as they used to say in the advert, that it's full of

Eastern promise in the saleroom and we might get a good price for it.

Well, that would be nice. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mark.

Linda, thank you for coming along today. Thank you.

And obviously, during the war, carried them round with her.

They are not English, they're Continental, German in fact.

And if we open the rather tatty little box, but none the less...

You've still got the original little information booklet there.

decorations on the cards, shall we say, and just

flicking through these, they are delicately drawn and coloured.

They seem more subtle and less fearful than modern tarot cards.

Basically, an enemy. An enemy. Oh dear. That's the snake.

I'm not sure with the actual readings.

I've found out a little bit online and managed to get back to 1930.

I think value-wise, you're probably looking in the region of ?20-?30,

I didn't actually think they were worth that much. Really?

If we can try them at the auction at that sort of estimate, ?20-?30,

and really, at that level I would advise not putting a reserve on.

I know the box is a bit tatty and everyone says how important that is,

Nice to see you. I gather you've had quite a lot of driving today.

More importantly, for bringing this rather interesting plaque with you.

And I know your name is Thomas Shaw, so obviously a family connection.

so I thought I'd bring it up and see how it went.

Wonderful. Did you find out why Thomas Shaw was awarded it?

He was a wool expert from London, England.

I believe something was going on in Australia

This is where it is interesting because you get

a lot of these plaques from the 19th century particularly.

attended these international conferences.

Purely because it's Victoria, obviously, in Australia. Australia.

Having said all that, you've also got a book that mentions

I've been assured that the saleroom we're using uses the Internet,

Now, it might be that in a specialist sale it might make more.

But if the auction house does the job right and attracts those buyers,

we might find we've got a sleeper. You never know, I suppose.

Exactly. If we get two rich Australians who want it, and

I think we probably will attract interest from Australia.

So I'm glad you've done that and we would love to put it in the show.

I look forward to seeing you at the auction. You too.

Well, we have something for everybody in today's auction.

Can anyone predict how well the German tarot cards will do?

And there's a lovely bit of family history with Tom Shaw's medallion.

For our auction today we're in a beautiful part of the countryside.

We're in Watlington, just outside of Oxford.

Will we hit the top end of our experts' valuations?

A set of tarot cards. They belonged to Linda.

They were her mum's, who had them during the war.

It's a complete set and our experts have put ?20-?30 on them.

I think that's a good, sensible value.

?30, no problem. What are your predictions?

Well...is there anybody there? The table's moving!

So first to wield the gavel is Simon's colleague, Francis Ogley.

And I hope you're right. It's a good name.

I'm hoping it will go, because you can still use it.

It's got the look, hasn't it? It really does have the look.

What I want to know is, good question, why are you flogging this?

The cut-glass and plated mount claret jug by Christofle, 11 inches.

That's what reserves are for. We protect it.

So far, so good. We're certainly raising the temperature in the room.

It's so hot, our next lot just might melt.

It's that chocolate book of nursery rhymes brought in by Rosalind.

Not a great deal of value, but it's so lovely, it's charming.

I hope we get the top end of that estimate. Mark? Will we do it?

I love this item. And I hope it makes way above the top estimate.

Secretly, that's what I'm praying for. It would be nice.

The talking's over. It's up to the bidders.

This is a novelty book, formed as a block of J Fry's chocolate.

Chocolate surprise nursery rhymes. ?30? ?25 I'm bid. 28, anywhere?

?55, and ?50 then, right in the corner, at ?50, all done at 50.

That's not bad, is it? It was the top end of the estimate, you know?

That's the all-important question on Flog It.

So they haven't told you anything yet? Not really.

Erm, general span. OK. Come on - and, and?

What were the predictions? We are all dying to know.

Double top estimate - that's what we want.

The fortune-telling cards or tarot cards, if you prefer.

Come on... 10, then, to start me. ?10 I am bid.

You didn't get the prediction I wanted.

You must have drawn the card upside down, I think.

Isn't that how it works? Yes, it must be.

And I've just been joined by young Tom Shaw, here.

You got up at 6 o'clock this morning.

Yes, had quite a long drive from South Wales.

He's got here in the nick of time. Most of the Flog It owners

live in the area but you've come a long way. So good on you.

I had a chat to the auctioneer.

He doesn't quite see Mark's valuation, 2-3.

The trouble is, I actually agree with the auctioneer.

I would hang on to this, if I were you.

I was thinking that myself as I was coming up here.

Thomas Shaw, the wool expert. What can we say for that?

?100, then. 50, I'm bid. 50, 55, 60, at ?65 then, anywhere, ?60?

At ?60? 70, ?70, then, are you all happy at ?70?

I would love to own something like that.

Yes, quite special with my name as well. Was thinking on the way up.

I'm happy to take it home. No doubt.

Don't forget, there's more auction action later on in the show but one

of the lots we've just sold was a set of tarot cards.

Now, I don't know anything about them, but I do believe in them.

So now is my chance to go and find out more.

Mention the word "tarot" and people conjure up images of

mystical tarot card readings conducted by fortune-tellers.

One of the foremost experts in the country is Cilla Conway,

who hopefully can dispel some of the myth associated with tarot.

Cilla, thank you for taking time out to talk to us today.

What are the general misconceptions of tarot?

Basically, that they're the Devil's Picture Book.

The tarot is often thought of as the royal road into the unconscious.

There's an Italian river tributary, Taro. T-A-R-0.

What dates are we talking about? It was about 1379,

but probably they were around for 50 years, at least, before that.

We know about them because they were condemned from a pulpit,

saying they were evil and should not be used.

What about playing a part in religion, because I know the Church

The church actually did us quite a favour

Even now Church people are so anti-tarot.

It's the first one you look at, and I'm looking down there.

The ways it's panned out, people don't read it as death,

they may read it as the death of something.

Change that's either forced on you or that you choose.

If you think the original packs were 40 years on from the Black Death,

so it's not really surprising that death figures quite largely.

Yes. And has the artwork changed much?

The original packs were done on wood blocks.

but the meanings and the suits and everything remain much as they were.

Cups, or chalices, have now transmogrified into hearts

and all the four suits are similar like that.

So you've got spades which were swords,

discs or pentacles, which were the diamonds

and batons, which might have related to peasants, for example.

You've also done your own artwork on a tarot card.

I went looking for packs and I thought they were too crude.

Then one evening I was doodling and found this fool, this card,

appearing on my pad in front of me, and I thought, "Wow."

In actual fact, we think that playing cards appropriated the fool.

They will work from the cards through their own intuition completely,

so they'll begin with the cards as a starting point.

Some people, and I'm one of them, will work only through the cards

and it'll be what the cards represent that I put into the reading.

Well, you've singled out four decks you've brought along.

Can you give me a brief overview of each one and maybe cut the cards.

1415 or thereabouts, the Visconti tarot.

Very beautiful, full of illuminated manuscript, gold, whatever.

I've cut it at judgement, which is actually quite interesting.

Very Christian iconography of the angels calling the dead,

God above the angels and the people coming out of the graves.

This is like a call for a new life, you might see it as.

This one is the Thoth pack, painted in the 1940s by Lady Freda Harris

for the arch-magician, Aleister Crowley.

Very powerful deck, a lot of people don't like it

because it has a very particular angle.

You need quite a lot of study to be able to use it.

This one is quite a good one to look at, the five of swords.

The feeling it gives me is about despair, deceit, feeling despondent.

That sort of thing. OK. The next deck...

A kind of celebration, happiness, marriage...

The support of friends would all come into that card,

and sometimes, just sometimes, a triangular relationship.

Lastly, the very small deck you've got.

This is the Ryder-Waite, it's a sort of industry standard now.

It was painted by Pamela Coleman in around 1910.

Basically, beautiful pack to use, really, really direct.

This one, which I've chosen, three wands.

The wands are all about creativity and intuition.

You've got somebody looking out and thinking about what his next move is.

or he's thinking about how he could work with some new idea he's got.

Hopefully, we've dispelled some of those preconceptions.

Well, we've got father and son today, Neville and Josh.

Can you tell us a little bit about it?

I can. It belongs to my father, Josh's grandfather.

My Dad bought it at a household sale in about 1958

for the princely sum of five shillings.

and he took the back off it and there was a grey hair across the mechanism.

He removed it and it started ticking away

and ticked quite faithfully for another 30 years until it stopped.

and does everything it should do now.

Five shillings was quite a lot of money in 1958. It was.

Do you know what five shillings is? No, I'm not really sure.

25p. Way before your time, Josh. Yeah, yeah.

I wanted to find an interesting item that somebody would like.

And be part of the show. Yeah. Let's have a little look at the clock now.

What I liked about it was this rather nice oval case.

That's the first thing that looked rather nice about it.

When you actually open it and take out the movement,

you've really got quite a basic travelling clock.

I understand you can set the alarm on it.

You can set the alarm for whatever time you wish to be alarmed at.

When it does alarm, unfortunately, it alarms until the spring has run down.

You don't set the alarm. You don't set the alarm.

If we take the back off, we can see exactly what it does here.

what the movement of the clock is, an eight-day timepiece.

We've also got a fitted key, so we've got everything we need there.

anything about it till the other week.

I found he got it repaired and all sorts like that.

It's been locked away in the cupboard. A bit of a waste, really.

It's better to give it to someone who's gonna appreciate it.

Yeah. Well, I like it. I think if we were putting it in for auction,

we'd have to bear in mind there's a little bit of damage on the case.

I think that could be repaired, it's such a nice case.

We don't want to give it away on the day. Would you be happy with that?

I certainly would be. I look forward to seeing you both at the auction.

They are very collectible. But this is extremely collectible.

My sister-in-law was clearing out and she said, "Can you make use of this?"

Then I couldn't get the slider to work,

Did you try and research its history or find out what it does?

And you've left it there for how long? A couple or three years.

Did your sister-in-law have connections with the brewery trade?

It's called the Skid Stick. I'm sure they'd love this.

The only reason I know it's related to the brewery industry

is because when you pull this one out,

it can measure and gauge ale, wine, malt and cider.

But I do know it's related to the brewery industry

because of what it tells me on there.

Incidentally, inside one of them, if I slide that one open,

I'd put this somewhere around circa 1870 to 1890.

Somebody's done that deliberately, maybe to deceive,

but I would love to know how this works.

Hopefully, the auctioneer will be able to tell me.

I'm gonna try and do some research and find out exactly what it does.

I know that the slide rule collectors' club

or anybody that's interested in instruments like this

will find it a delight to play with, and it's a real curio.

It'll never do any good in the drawer.

No. It need to be looked at and played with.

and I thought it just as well go to somebody

who could either make use of it or would be glad to display it.

Yeah. I think I can see this selling for in-between ?50 and ?100.

Shall we flog it? Yes. OK. ?50 to ?100.

Lovely. Let's hope it does top end, shall we? Thank you very much.

A nice map of Berkshire you've brought in to show us.

It was part of our wedding present in 1971

Did you live in Berkshire at the time? Yes. Yes, you did.

And of course you're wearing the St John Ambulance Brigade's uniform.

Yes. We're here providing first aid cover, so I brought our map along

just in case there was time to be valued like the Flog It people do.

You are selling this on your behalf? Our behalf, yes.

it's nice to get one of you St John Ambulance people up on camera.

Every one that I do, you do a valiant job in the background.

Going back to the map, it is a very nice one. It's by John Speed.

I believe so, but I can only go by what's on the back.

I don't think there's any doubt about that.

It's 17th century. The colouring might be later.

We've got, obviously, Windsor represented,

a wonderful prospect of Windsor Castle,

I often wondered who he was. I'm wondering that as well.

I was hoping you weren't going to ask me. I don't know, actually.

If he's been stuck on a paper... For 400 years! ..you'd be unhappy.

We've got all the borders and counties.

It's generally in quite good condition.

Often they're in these quite simple frames.

I would have a plain, wooden frame, myself, if I had it.

I like it. The value does depend on what county is it.

They're not priceless. They're not hugely valuable.

No. I would have thought we'd get around about ?200 to ?300.

Really? We never thought of the value, really.

You've had it as a wedding present for 35 years.

It's been hanging on your wall. Yes, in the darkest corner.

No. What about your husband, Alan? He doesn't hate it as much as I do.

I guess that's why you're flogging it.

Right now we're heading straight back to Watlington.

The first of our items if Josh and Neville's clock.

Hopefully Linda's map should attract a lot of local interest.

I think this has to be one of my favourite little items of the day,

As you know, it's a slide rule, a gauge, publicans would have used.

It's a really nice thing. I actually think this is my favourite object.

We've got 1,200 or 1,300 lots in here.

Oh, good, good... That's the one I really think is the best of the lot.

for that unfortunate purpose, the excise duty

so you can calculate how much alcohol there is in a beer barrel.

And there's even a rule in there for cider.

I think that was an ambitious dealer trying to sell it, to tie in with...

Yes, I mean, why would a "Williams" make any difference to it?

Just an optimist. Will we get that ?100, do you think?

It is. Yes, a very tactile object with a lot of surface quality.

We're looking at the top end here, we want 150 quid plus.

It's got a lovely story, because it survived a burglary, didn't it?

Somebody stole it, they just threw it down a bunch of stairs

and it landed in the hallway down at the bottom.

They took the TV and video, but left the clock.

It was your father's. He bought it for five bob in 1958.

The shape is nice and it's a lovely fitted box.

Under the circumstances, one understands why it is.

Oh, set bells ringing! It was used as an alarm clock, wasn't it?

It was. So, you've got yourself a battery alarm clock now.

Something a bit more functional. A bit more reliable.

It's just about to go under the hammer. This is it.

Travelling alarm clock, white enamel dial.

80, then, to start me. 50 if you like.

95. 100 with you. At ?100. 110? At ?100. Are you all happy at ?100?

That was short and sweet, right on the reserve.

He ran it right up, there was a bid on the book.

Who's getting the hundred quid, then?

I think Josh here. I think it's going to a cattery.

Our cats have just gone into a cattery this week.

We're going on holiday for three weeks whilst we're moving house.

that's Linda who helped us out at the valuation day,

because she represents the St John Ambulance Brigade,

but we've got her husband, Alan, who's also...

St John Ambulance. St John Ambulance, yes. I love this map.

Let's face it, right on the border. Yeah.

Hope it does well. Speed is one of the best cartographers.

Let's hope we get that top end of the estimate. Will we crack it?

I think so. It's a typical Speed map.

It's got nice imagery and Windsor Castle running across the top.

It's got part of Oxfordshire, part of Buckinghamshire on there.

Let's hope the map collectors are here.

Speed's Berkshire. 17th century, hand-carved map, Hogarth frame.

200 for that. 100 to start me. ?100? 100.

180. Selling at 180. We're all done at 180.

That's using his discretion on that ?200.

My wife will be pleased. She'll be pleased.

I'm a little bit disappointed... I'm like you, Paul.

But we got it away. That's the name of the game - we flogged it.

Belongs to Stanley, and it's just about to go under the hammer.

Had a chat to the auctioneer earlier. He loved it.

I think we're going to get a great result.

The auctioneer might buy it himself, he was that in love with it!

Fingers crossed. Going under the hammer.

A publican's or brewer's boxwood rule.

130 with you by the door, at ?130. 140 anywhere?

You see, it was rare, and people do collect these.

It's an instrument, a gentleman's toy, to calculate things with.

So, what are you going to do with ?130, Stanley?

That's a nice surprise, isn't it? Well, I expected to take it home.

No, you didn't, did you? I did, really.

The wife brought one or two things which were of no value, and I said,

I zoomed in on that one, I spotted that, didn't I?

You certainly did. Thank you very much, Stanley.

bring them along to one of our valuation days.

It could be you flogging something, just like Stanley was here.

The anthems ahead of Scotland's last match of 2013. The Tartan