finds under floorboards in period homes

[Zebra]

Intrigued to know whether when people sell their house it's usual to leave any historic finds with it?

Have people here left them - or have they been left them?

My personal take would be to leave them - on condition that the new owners were interested and likely to look after them and pass them on. I would hate to think that things that are 'precious' to me (and the building) like little leather shoes or old sulphur matches would just get chucked in the bin the day they moved in. But then how do you pass them on to future owners who would be interested?

I can identify with this dilemma. Having found an old child's shoe under the floor, as well as many bones and bits of glassware and pottery, I don't know what to do with it all, and would hate the idea of a future owner throwing it all away.
So I think I shall secrete my treasures in a hidey hole under the stairs, so that only an intrepid, interested future owner can find them.

 

[LadyArowana]

I can identify with this dilemma. Having found an old child's shoe under the floor, as well as many bones and bits of glassware and pottery, I don't know what to do with it all, and would hate the idea of a future owner throwing it all away.
So I think I shall secrete my treasures in a hidey hole under the stairs, so that only an intrepid, interested future owner can find them.

Yes, hide them, together with a piece of paper ( the older looking the better ) inscribed with dire warnings about the consequences of ignoring the ancient curse that says such things should never be removed from the property.

 

[Flyfisher]

We are immensely fortunate in having many of the historic Deed documents to our Georgian cottage. They are very beautiful, handwritten legal documents of various kinds, sealed with red wax.

Aren't they lovely things? We are also fortunate to have many of the original deeds and other documents, going back to when the house was part of a 250 acre estate (sadly, such days are long gone). We had a whole 4 drawer filing cabinet full of various deeds, conveyances, wayleaves and associated documents. Mrs FF has a done a sterling job reading through them all, weeding out the duplicates and creating a detailed index and summary, but we still have three large plastic filing tubs full of paperwork that basically belong to the house and it's future occupants.

The advent of Land Registry was undoubtedly a good thing in terms of guaranteeing and proving titles but it has meant that these wonderful historical documents are no longer a legal necessity and, as such, many of them are being lost as banks and solicitors no longer need to store them safely as securities and so now generally charge for storage.

 

[Penners]

we still have three large plastic filing tubs full of paperwork that basically belong to the house and it's future occupants.

Yes, they're greatly to be treasured, FF - specially with a house as important as yours. We shall of course pass ours on to any future successors in the house.

I confess, however, that our previous finds of artefacts (as I mentioned above) have not been left behind in previous houses. Rather than being house-specific I regard these as coming under the heading of "finders keepers". So we've hung on to them - mainly because we reckon we earned them, having renovated the houses ourselves, but also because one has no guarantee that future owners won't regard them as a load of old rubbish and bin them.

 

[xanthe]

I made a point of asking our conveyancing solicitor ( :evil: ) to request the copies of any deeds in the current owner's possession. Not sure if it will turn anything up.

My parents had the ones for their C17th house that went right back. Beautiful things. They've only got some for the new house, but it showed it belonged to one of the last 'hanging judges' in Devon. Lovely...

Penners, I don't think there is a right or wrong to it with a lot of finds. Deeds and documents I deem as 'property of the house' and I couldn't personally take away things like little shoes or witch bottles (or mummified cats). I would probably hold onto anything like a ring or old coins. I kept the tiny doll's head and the clay pipes I dug up in my parents gardens.

 

[philpjuk100]

Pics of a few finds,the little seal was pushed into a crack in a beam as was a couple of bronze finger rings,they have been replaced where we found them.Lots of civil war stuff in the garden (buttons,balls,musket and canon,chunks of melted lead,buckles etc) The watch was found three spades depth down below a demolished greenhouse!.

 

[philpjuk100]

Some more finds,the seal is scottish and found oposite the house and although far earlier than the civil war may have been lost by a scot during the seige of newark as they were stationed here.The head is from a roman statue and found by a friend as part of her garden rockery!.test pits show the land has been disturbed but has turned up lots of civil war stuff and pot sherds back to the middle ages.A lot of coins and clay pipe parts were found where a row of three "thunder boxes" had been demolished.

 

[Penners]

Lots of civil war stuff in the garden (buttons,balls,musket and canon,chunks of melted lead,buckles etc) The watch was found three spades depth down

I trust the watch wasn't found below the Civil War stuff! :shock:

 

[philpjuk100]

No,but it was under lots of victorian pot/glass,I think the gardener must have dug the soil in the greenhouse quite deeply,it appears the greenhouse had been built on the "midden". Musket balls are all over the the garden at all depths,(well up to 1.2m,as deep as we have dug test pits!)

 

[LadyArowana]

Lots of civil war stuff in the garden (buttons,balls,musket and canon,chunks of melted lead,buckles etc) The watch was found three spades depth down

I trust the watch wasn't found below the Civil War stuff! :shock:

Pesky time travel, always messing up the archaeology.

 

[Feltwell]

Not perhaps quite as exciting as the finds above, today's "hidden treasure" was a set of car keys well & truly jammed & hidden behind the kitchen radiator, dating I would say back to the 1970's/80's, look like they came from a BL car. Alas, there is no keyless Rover SD1 3500 sat in the garage, or a P5B Coupe, or any other car just sat there waiting for the keys to turn up.

Knowing my luck, even if there was it would be an Austin "Aggro" Allegro or a rusty Mini Metro