# What is the oldest object in your home? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 30, 2014, 7:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000 "2014-09-30T19:31:47Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![gotpasswords](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c57346/32.png) [@gotpasswords](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gotpasswords)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/21 "2014-09-30T22:31:31Z")
Ignoring geologically-formed things like rocks, gemstones, hydrogen atoms or similar, I know I’ve got some books from 1895 or so. They’re packed up somewhere after our recent move, so I can’t confirm them at the moment. Our two oldest bits of technology would be a wood wall phone that’s been roughly dated to 1913-1917, and a Victrola that was built in late 1914. ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/22 "2014-09-30T22:40:10Z")
I have some old scores. A _Damnation of Faust_ which claims a copyright of 1880, and two Novello scores, one of Haydn’s _Creation_ and another of Handel’s _Messiah_, which I can’t find any date in. Given the similarity of appearance and the price (both two shillings), I assume they are contemporary, and the _Messiah_ score has a reference to a facsimile reproduced with “permission of Her Majesty the Queen”. Since they clearly predate Elizabeth II, I presume that makes them Victorian. Of course, that’s a pretty wide range. ---
**Author:** ![Baker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bb73d2/32.png) [@Baker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baker)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/23 "2014-09-30T22:43:13Z")
Some items from my grandparents youth. A cologne bottle and a candy dish. The dish is a treasured memory. It used to sit on Grandman’s back porch and we’d try to sneak candy, not knowing that of course she knew what the kids were up to. ---
**Author:** ![Balance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ccd318/32.png) [@Balance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Balance)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/24 "2014-09-30T22:44:08Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > I got Fossils. > Fossil clams, fossil coral. > I win. And I have a piece of Precambrian rock, so I think we can drop this line and let the thread stick to artifacts. 😛 On which note, I don’t have many very old human-made items. The oldest might be a glue bottle I found that dates to between 1916 and 1920. Otherwise, the title probably goes to one of my musical instruments–I have a few that are obviously pretty old, but I haven’t made any real effort to determine just how old. ---
**Author:** ![Battle\_Pope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Battle\_Pope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Battle_Pope)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/25 "2014-09-30T22:44:12Z")
I’ve got a few stone spearheads I’ve picked up in my wanderings around the country, so anywhere between 40,000 & 200 years old. An early edition of [Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extraordinary_Popular_Delusions_and_the_Madness_of_Crowds), from memory, published about 1850. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 10:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/26 "2014-09-30T22:51:35Z")
Trilobite fossils are probably the oldest, but can’t be dated to better than 100,000 years +/-. For actual dated artifacts: Several Roman coins dated to the reign of Augustus, which makes them @2000 years old. Various household items that have been dated to the 1700s. A couple of rifles that date to the 1800s. In fact, quite a bit of ephemera that dates to the 1800s - shot glasses, eye glasses, knives, barware, etc. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/27 "2014-09-30T23:31:49Z")
A magnifying glass, that swivels into a leather holder, with a horn rim. Acquired by my grandfather shortly after he immigrated to the USA in 1905, or possibly brought with him from the old country. I still carry it in my pocket all the time. It’s been a family possession for over 100 years and still in daily use. ---
**Author:** ![Becky2844](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/91b2a8/32.png) [@Becky2844](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Becky2844)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/28 "2014-09-30T23:33:05Z")
It might be the Arts and Crafts desk I’m sitting at right now. Or the cedar table that my husbands (he’s 67) grandfather helped make. They might be around a hundred years old. ---
**Author:** ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/29 "2014-09-30T23:34:46Z")
A box of 14 crayons from about 1890. ---
**Author:** ![garygnu](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/garygnu/32/2924_2.png) [@garygnu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/garygnu)\ **Post date:** [September 30, 2014, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/30 "2014-09-30T23:44:41Z")
I have a couple meteorites, both are Sikhote-Alin. Depending on how you date it, they are either 60 years old or millions of years old. Apart from that, I have a Celtic money ring from about 500BC. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/31 "2014-10-01T00:26:47Z")
Somewhere around here are some coins that predate Christ - that would be the earliest manmade object. Arrowheads, but they are harder to date - they may or may not predate the coins - probably not. Fossils, but that seems like cheating. Rock from the North Shore - which is apparently some of the oldest rock on earth. ---
**Author:** ![seal\_cleaner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@seal\_cleaner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/seal_cleaner)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/32 "2014-10-01T00:29:33Z")
A seventeenth century netsuke. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 12:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/33 "2014-10-01T00:47:39Z")
Fossils and a Roman coin or two, potsherds. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/34 "2014-10-01T00:53:25Z")
Ignoring a fossil I bought at the Page Museum… I think the oldest object in my home is my 1897 Winchester Model 92. ---
**Author:** ![CraterLayer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@CraterLayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CraterLayer)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/35 "2014-10-01T01:00:54Z")
My dad still has a fifty year old bottle of barely used Aqua-Velva aftershave that I bought him for fathers day when I was six. ---
**Author:** ![Infovore](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/infovore/32/420_2.png) [@Infovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Infovore)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/36 "2014-10-01T01:01:49Z")
I have a small copy of _Pilgrim’s Progress_ that was published in 1734. It was on my dad’s bookshelf since I was a small child, and when he passed away, I took it home along with some of his other things. It’s tied together with a shoelace and I’m afraid to open it. ---
**Author:** ![notfrommensa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f14d63/32.png) [@notfrommensa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/notfrommensa)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/37 "2014-10-01T01:22:46Z")
I have several things that date back to the 1800’s. I got a chair that my great grandfather crafted. I have a family picture portrait of the same great grandfather when he was a young boy. He was born in the 1870’s. (this is probably the oldest) There are probably some other pictures too. I have some China that were wedding presents to my Great grandparents. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/38 "2014-10-01T01:23:26Z")
We also did [this exact subject](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=702989) a year ago. The oldest things I own that I know of are a couple of 1904 physics textbooks. One of them has an offhand mention of Michelson and Morley in one paragraph, and the other has no hint at all of the coming changes. ---
**Author:** ![BlackKnight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/eb8c5e/32.png) [@BlackKnight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlackKnight)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/39 "2014-10-01T01:33:21Z")
I have a copy of Hawthorne’s “True Stories” from the 1850s. Also, a few textbooks from the mid-1800’s (algebra, grammar, arithmetic, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![fachverwirrt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/94ad74/32.png) [@fachverwirrt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fachverwirrt)\ **Post date:** [October 1, 2014, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000/40 "2014-10-01T01:35:00Z")
> [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](#): > > I got Fossils. > Fossil clams, fossil coral. > I win. I have gold, which was created in whatever star pre-dated the Sun. So something more than 4.5 billion years. So there. 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-the-oldest-object-in-your-home/700000.md?page=3)