Can anyone tell me what this tool is?

[Mrs McG]

I’ve dug up a fair few horseshoes and axes in the garden but I’ve now uncovered this and don’t know what it is. Does anyone know? It’s 18 inches long and the cottage was originally a farmhouse if those facts help!

 

[Cubist]

Several possibilities but most likely a 'fireside poker' used to settle and distribute the embers of a coal or wood fire. I rescued one similar but shorter from our garden not long after we moved in. If it has a square profile it could also be used to burn, when red hot, square holes through timber to mount iron furniture such as hinges and the like. Also sometimes used to cauterise animal and human wounds.

 

[CliffordPope]

Poker seems the obvious answer, but why the two rings? The lower one appears to have been properly swaged on (if that is the correct word), but the upper almost looks like a hexagonal nut, only how was it fixed, and why?
It also looks a bit short - I similarly dug one up in the garden, but it is about 30" long, and no rings.

It's fascinating recording or keeping all the junk of the ages dug up on the premises. Dozens of horseshoes, from the most enormous cart horse to a dainty pony, with several different styles for different ground conditions, bits of farm implement, cast off plough shares, a horse drawn furrow digger for planting potatoes, old gates, several decayed Morris Minors, buried lorry chassis, and a rusty cylinder that looked like an unexploded shell but I think is simply an hydraulic cylinder from a digger.

Our son got quite keen on archaeology, and dug up patches a metre square in the lawn, carefully lifting, cleaning and dating old discarded electrical fittings, toothpaste tubes, ring pulls, and most exitingly, a layer of old dinky toys including a Studebaker Golden Hawk and an Aston Martin DB4.

 

[LadyArowana]

I think poker is likely. The rings just a decorative element, this set has one very similar https://www.georgianantiques.net/product/antique-set-of-3-victorian-cast-brass-and-steel-fire-tools/

 

[Cubist]

We too have found many trinkets, as Henry Cole might have them, while exploring this old place and none have ever been allowed to leave. Amongst may other things theres the business end of an old flat-iron that was presumably discarded when the handle fell off, the remains of a paraffin heater, aforementioned poker, dozens of bottles - for both forms of self medication - bits of enigmatic farm and garden kit, cutlery - knives, forks and spoons - equine harness and bits, Only the finds such as broken glass and the remnants of old batteries that were, I believe, used to light the way to the privy and maybe read whilst ensconced. But my favourite items are the tin box full of buttons and ladies suspender clips and best of all a tiny pottery robin and a two man wood saw.

 

[Mrs McG]

Definitely a fire poker then, mine is just like the one in LadyArowana’s reply, only less posh. I can’t imagine how it ended up in the ground 75ft away from the cottage but I have a delightful image of the farmer’s wife chasing away an unwelcome visitor to her vegetable garden

My favourite has to be a tiny, delicate horseshoe I dug up that’s less than 2.5 inches wide. It even still has one nail in.

 

[Cubist]

My favourite has to be a tiny, delicate horseshoe I dug up that’s less than 2.5 inches wide. It even still has one nail in.

You remind me; while still hunting a suitable property, we came across one on the edge of a forest and neighboured by a farm. While looking around a couple of miniature ponies charged across the adjacent field and 'Under' the ranch style fence into the garden.

We didn't make an offer after discovering the whiff from the poultry farm next door.

 

[LadyArowana]

My favourite has to be a tiny, delicate horseshoe I dug up that’s less than 2.5 inches wide. It even still has one nail in.

That must have been a very mini pony! I have 2 lightweight ones which were given me from a winning racehorse. They are now hung up in the Unicorn Stable ( aka the vaults ) along with a Spanish tile that gives a nod to the mad bat lady who thought some bats might be getting in and roosting.

 

[Mrs McG]

Here it is, I wondered if it might have been made for a toy horse?