So finally an update on the maps – yes plural – but be warned there is a wince coming on. And a long read so, as ever, brace yourself.

Just a quick re-cap. 

In our unearthing of stuff the now-resigned manager had left stuffed under, in and around the behind-the-scenes parts of our shop, we found a lovely old map of Windsor and the 25 miles around.

We were very excited about this map and why not, it is a lovely old thing.

Anyway, as part of the shop’s lucky hinterland, I have been in touch with a man who has considerable expertise himself but as well as that, has his own hinterland of experts who can tell us what we have.

(We are lucky to have him and the occasional chat about what he has been collecting, things found in junk and charity shops, and what I have brought to him – are much appreciated.)

Brace yourselves, it is not always good news.

So, if you came across a map from the 1700s, printed and then hand-coloured with the local boundaries and the size of a smallish kitchen table, you might think you were on to a good thing.

But, apparently it was worth no more than £200. Our hinterland expert found someone in his hinterland and that man knew what he was talking about.

I thought a conversation with a local auctioneer might have be coming on, but decided to list it on Oxfam online first, just to see…

Meanwhile, more unearthing found us this.

Also from the 1700s but, according to our new and excellent expert, re-backed onto so later canvas.

Now a map of the Loire is unlikely to sell in the shop. We have relatively few customers who own a second home in the area.

I will list it on Oxfam online and see what happens.

Are you ready for the wince?

OK, so the lovely, hand coloured, printed as part of George III’s demand for accurate mileage between turnpikes, showing all sorts of interesting things including ” remarkable hills” Windsor map:

I did list it on Oxfam Online for £200.

And Oxfam decided to have (another) sale. Everything listed for more than three months got reduced. 50% and then 70% and so our beautiful map went to someone for just £75.

I was gutted.

Now I should have moved it out of the listings so that the sale would pass it by and that was something I failed to do – I would also have had a lot of books too to move – books don’t sell like clothes.

(Somehow, I thought that an old map, one as lovely as our’s would be exempt from the sale algorithm but that was me being distracted and not getting to check the comms about when the sale was sorted.

There were the 14 questions other volunteers had when I started the day, and the 20 things on my list of what to do that day, and the fact we needed milk for tea and coffee that I was making for us, so I went to get it, how to get an order for stationery when I don’t have a password to get into the system because I am a volunteer and not staff, the chat someone wants about the next few window displays, emptying the indoor bins and calling Biffa again about why they haven’t emptied the outside bins, someone texting me to say they can’t make their shift, who is going to cover Saturday afternoon……….. Excuses I know, but sometimes the urgent take over from the the important.)

Many books need to sit there quietly waiting for the collector of tractor books, or old maps, or special bindings, or the small publisher from the 19th century or or or…..

Of course, maybe we would never had sold it for £200 and yes, of course £75 all adds to Oxfam’s ability to help people for whom £75 is a vast amount.

I do know that, but I still think we might have got more.

Finally, on maps we have a map of Hampshire – yes Petersfield is in Hampshire – from 1821.

So, our expert got his experts to give us a valuation, and it is not much.

Think £30.

But, I am on a roll to recover from the Windsor map and I think there might be someone walking past the shop who might be willing to pay £75 for such a lovely thing.

We will try it and see.

But before I go, a bit about this map.

So, in 1821, Bournemouth didn’t exist according to this map, but according to Wikipedia:

‘Before it was founded in 1810 by Lewis Tregonwell, the area was a deserted heathland occasionally visited by fishermen and smugglers. Initially marketed as a health resort, the town received a boost when it appeared in Augustus Granville‘s 1841 book, The Spas of England.^[1] Bournemouth’s growth accelerated with the arrival of the railway, and it became a town in 1870.’

They are both interesting men – worth a bit of a look.

And West Sussex where I live looks a bit like ‘There be dragons country.’

I have to say, that the dragons round here these days probably drive 4×4 and have swingy blonde ponytails but can breathe quite a lot of fire if you don’t give them room on country lanes and immediately move your Citroen Picasso into the ditch. Just saying.

Hundreds by the way are administrative divisions –

The origin of the division of counties into hundreds is described by the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) as “exceedingly obscure”. It may once have referred to an area of 100 hides. (In the early Anglo-Saxon period a hide was the amount of land farmed by and required to support a peasant family, but by the eleventh century in many areas it supported four families.^[1]) Alternatively the hundred may have been an area originally settled by one “hundred” men at arms, or the area liable to provide one “hundred” men under arms.^[2] (Note that in earlier times the number term “hundred” can itself be unclear, meaning the “short” hundred (100) or in some contexts the long hundred of 120.) Wikipedia.

And why on earth would Odiham (pronounced Odiam, in case you are planning a visit) be the point from which all distances were measured?

Odiham is the home of the Royal Air Force Chinook heavy lift helicopter fleet and I can attest to that because they fly over us – apparently learning how to go up and over the Downs as practice for some hills elsewhere.

Maybe also taking senior military types to golf, who knows…

But I gather that Odiham was equidistance from Winchester and Windsor.

Now, Winchester has a long history of power and clergy.

I have never been to that village but what a great address that would be. ‘Yes, itchings plural and no, I don’t know what the problem was.’

And well, Windsor, need I say more.

I’ll let you know if we get the £75.