Whilst recently completing an audit of the artefacts stored at Avenue Farm, we came across some lovely glassware, intriguing examples of scientific instruments and more practical items which would have been found in a Victorian kitchen. However we also came across one or two items which made us laugh. They were all correctly labelled, documented and carefully packed away! We discovered three horse shoes, not four and only two of them measured the same! Bizarrely there was also a small collection of miniature plastic flowers and pieces for a toy garden. Why did we find four pieces of silver foil carefully stored? Apparently they were discovered under the floorboards in Halls Croft in 2006 and deemed to be important. Finally the egg! There are many, many depictions of William Shakespeare, but the oddest one must be in the form of a wooden egg with a flat bottom! It was a prototype souvenir. How many would have been sold can only be guessed at!
Written by Victoria Young, to read more posts on this subject see the blog posts at FindingShakespeare