Antiques Roadshow guest blurts out ‘woah’ at car boot sale false teeth's unforeseen price

WARNING: This article contains spoilers from Antiques Roadshow. 

An Antiques Roadshow guest was amazed at the staggering value of a set of false teeth discovered at the bottom of a “junk box”.

BBC expert John Foster met with the owner of an unusual item with a crowd gathering behind, intrigued to find out what the specialist had to say.

“Now I’ve been doing the Roadshow for over 10 years now and this is the one thing I’ve always wanted to see”, Foster began.

“I know you’re going to think I’m weird but why have you got them?”

The guest replied: “Well my dad bought a box of junk at a boot fair. He paid a few pounds and they were at the bottom of the box.”

He continued to explain that the plate, springs and pins that hold the teeth are in gold.

It was then time for Foster to elaborate further: “Now you were pretty wealthy if you had a set of teeth like this.

“It’s like you say, they are in gold and the rare thing about them is that they’re porcelain teeth.

“And the history of anything like this is fascinating, because with teeth during the 18th century, the wealthy obviously had vast amounts of sugar and generally their teeth were rotten, their breath stank and they would lose their teeth. And they needed to sort it out.

“Surgeons tried everything from implanting teeth into chicken’s heads to see if it would take and you’d pull out your tooth if you were poor and sell it instantaneously to try and implant it.

“None of that really worked so when they came up with a set of teeth like this, it was the obvious solution.

“Now these are made of porcelain on a gold background but the earlier ones from the Napoleonic wars, they actually went round, let’s say after the Battle Of Waterloo, picked up the teeth from all the bodies and corpses, pulled them out, and then sold them to make denture sets like this.

“So English people were going around with French teeth in their mouths.

“This is why I love it. I know it’s disgusting and horrible but it’s a fascinating history, because here, I would say about 1845, 1855 in date.”

Foster then began to conclude, revealing the surprising price of the item.

“The fact that they’re porcelain, I love”, he said.

“They are, I’m not going to say any jokes like they’re as rare as hen’s teeth or anything like that, but they are incredibly rare.

“And the fact that they’re gold, the fact that they’re porcelain, £2,000, £2,500.”

The guest’s eyes widened as he exclaimed: “Woah. I’m amazed. Wow.”

Foster continued: “So this is a rare survivor, which is why I’m saying I’ve been waiting 10 years to see a set. Thank you very much.”

Antiques Roadshow is available to watch on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.