This is an antique highly decorative full sized 3 foot tall presentation SPADE. It is made from silver plated metal mounts with a long spiralled hardwood handle.
The digging round nosed SPADE has been engraved with:
Presented
to
F.A. WOOD ESQr
Upon The Occasion of Commencing
F.A. WOOD ESQr
Upon The Occasion of Commencing
The
Brent District Drainage Contract No. 1
October 20th
1884.
1884.
Maker's name is Mappin Brothers Regent St. which is on the back.
The handle has typical silver plated chunky mounts which are decorative.
The silver plating has been polished off over the years by over cleaning and polishing.
Brent is a borough in London.
Please see photographs provided for more details and visual confirmation of condition for yourself.
Normal signs of age and use wear including some surface scuffs and minor impact marks etc. It has a hole drilled through the shaft near the bottom where it has probably been attached to a wall at some time in its life.
The silver plating is worn from over polishing whilst on display probably.
It measures approx. 36 inches long, which of course is 3 foot tall. The curved digging spade is 9 inch wide at the widest top part. The wooden handle is 4 and 3/4 inch wide. It weighs approx. 1.4 kilos.
These type of ceremonial presentation items are UNIQUE and they didn't produce more than one of them. Ideal for the local social history collector / museum of the place names upon them or for related family members that didn't even know these existed.
My stock ref : #DC/121023/Q525ty in presentation keys cabinet.
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If you see A/F = a/f in the title or description it means "as found" condition which may have scuffs, scratches and damage. In relation to all my listings it does not mean " about fine ". I have used A/F for " as found " for 45 years.