Imperial Russian silver at Slane Castle

IRISH PEOPLE end up in the most unexpected and extraordinary places. Limerick woman Margaretta Alexandra Eagar wasn’t exactly born – in 1863 – with a silver spoon in her mouth. One of 10 children of a Protestant couple, she trained as a nurse and ended up in imperial Russia’s Romanov court as nanny to four princesses – the daughters of the ill-fated Tsar Nicholas II.

A silver cloisonné (enamelled) spoon given to her by the Empress of Russia in 1904 is stamped with the crowned, two-headed imperial eagle of the Russian coat of arms. The spoon, made by St Petersburg imperial goldsmiths, the Grachev Brothers, was inherited by a descendant of Eagar and is one of the star lots (€3,000-€5,000) in Adam’s third annual Irish country house collection sale at Slane Castle next Tuesday. Last year’s sale produced a big surprise when the Empress of Austria’s riding whip sold for €37,000 – 10 times the estimate.

This year’s highlights include items from the collection of the late Edward McGuire, of Newtown House, Blackrock, Co Dublin, a Fine Gael senator and the proprietor and chairman of the Brown Thomas department store, who died in 1992; and items from the estate of the late Serge and Henriette Boissevain who owned the Ballynatray Estate near Youghal from 1996-2004. A selection of furniture by the renowned Dublin cabinetmaker James Hicks, includes an inlaid satinwood commode (€6,000-€10,000).

The auction features over 600 lots of furnishings, paintings, silver, glass, porcelain and pictures, with prices ranging from €100 up to €30,000. Among notable lots: an Irish Georgian giltwood mirror c 1765 which once adorned a house in Merrion Square (€15,000-€25,000); a painting, Rocky River Landscape With Figures by George Barret (€20,000-€30,000); a Louis XIV tortoiseshell mantel clock (€4,000-€6,000); and a pair of antique lead sculptures of greyhounds (€3,000-€5,000).

Viewing at Slane Castle begins this morning at 11am. Admission is by catalogue only, priced €20