serendipity- a face from the past

I was digging in the garden when I saw this tiny face looking at me. We find a lot of old china in our garden, dating from the time when there were no such things as dustmen in the countryside, and broken things went on the midden.

I wonder whose face this is, and how he or she was broken? And why has it come to the surface now, when I've been digging that particular patch for the last twenty five years?

Domestic archaeology is fascinating. I keep digging up bits of this mug (?) and I've been trying to work out what it would have said for years.

















The other things we find a lot in the fields around here are round flints- a whole different timescale of history. That one in the middle looks as though its got a secret sign inscribed on it. 





The most interesting flints are the ones that are fossilised sea urchins, sometimes called shepherds' crowns, like the one bottom right. Once you've found one, you can't stop looking for them on every walk.

                                                                                                                       
Of course, a lot of left over household objects end up in your friendly local junkshop- this is my favourite. 




























I always think the boxes of kitchen utensils are particularly poignant, everyone's kitchen cutlery drawer says a lot about their personality, and its so sad to see them discarded. I've been known to take pity on those old ladles and slices with the painted wooden handles that my Mum used to have, and buy them to take home...