Reader, it’s a lock of Jane Austen’s hair (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

Reader, it’s a lock of Jane Austen’s hair

9:10am Thursday 22nd May 2008 in News By Gazette Reporter

A LOCK of what could be Jane Austen's hair will go under the hammer in South Cerney next week.

The hair was fashioned into an "in memoriam" piece of jewellery.

The fine brown hair has been been made into a weeping willow, an often used symbol of mourning and also resurrection, with branches shading the decorated gravestone of Jane Austen.

Her name is lettered in hair strands on the gravestone.

The piece is skilfully glued on an oval piece of vellum measuring 55mm by 75mm and mounted in a typical early to mid 19th-century wooden frame with an acorn and oak leaves gilt clasp and hook.

"We have been researching this for some time," said Dominic Winter.

"We have shown it to various Austen and decorative object experts including Tom Carpenter, curator at the Jane Austen House, Chawton, in Alton, Hampshire, where we compared it with the only other known lock of Austen's hair.

"There is no sign that this was made recently or to deceive, the lucky vendor who spotted it some twenty years ago among some bric-a-brac having no idea of its previous provenance."