Extraordinary Antique Swedish Gilt Silver Bangle, Vadstena 1851

Hold her up to the light, and you are holding 175 years of Swedish history. This is a bangle in gilt silver - warm gold over solid silver - with a gently waving band covered in hand-engraved and chased flowers and leaves, every petal cut by hand more than a century and a half ago.

She was made in 1851 in Vadstena, the little convent town of Saint Birgitta on the shore of Lake Vättern - a town so proud of its silver that the city mark is Birgitta's own haloed head, and where a royal letter of 1596 allowed no more than six goldsmiths at a time. Her maker was Johan Frans Oscar Holm, who had become a master silversmith just two years before she was made - and among the works attributed to his hand is a bridal crown in Vadstena Abbey itself. She is fully hallmarked, with the year mark U4 for 1851.

She weighs around 28 grams with an inside circumference of around 6.5 inches. She is in excellent condition with minor signs of age.