The Rocky Horror Coffin Clock – Burials & Past

2023-05-07 08:14:21

It’s astounding. Time is fleeting. Insanity takes its toll…

So sang Riff Raff in The Rocky Horror Image Present. Because the Transylvanian servant leads the unsuspecting younger couple of Brad and Janet by way of the fortress’s rooms, we’re dazzled with a riot of color, oddities and wild dancing. Nevertheless, for all of the movie’s superb units, a couple of props stick within the thoughts.

When Riff Raff strikes in direction of a coffin together with his duster, he flings open the hinged lid to disclose a really cobweb-ridden skeleton. This could possibly be seen as a really becoming schlocky ornamental alternative, thrown collectively by the props division to hammer residence the creepy nature of the fortress… Besides that it was actual. Not solely was the coffin clock an actual vintage, however held an actual human skeleton.

The clock had been rented from Ken Paul’s London props firm, which was as soon as the most important repository for props within the capital. For many years, Ken Paul’s was the go-to place for something vintage and weird, from bronze busts to uncommon taxidermy, manufacturing corporations might fulfil all their wants beneath Ken’s 6 storey Hampstead store.

In March 2002, following the retirement of Ken’s daughter Christine, the contents of the store went up for public sale at Sotherby’s, giving the general public a uncommon glimpse into the worlds of movie and peculiar antiques. Within the public sale have been an enormous variety of recognisable props, together with a globe from Harry Potter and the Thinker’s Stone, goblets from Gladiator and a hand mirror from Titanic. In line with the Irish Instances, probably the most grand of all was a ‘six-foot tall carved wood Buddha from the James Bond film The Man with the Golden Gun, starring Roger Moore. Anticipated to fetch between £10,000 and £15,000 sterling, it additionally featured in Carry On Up The Khyber, starring Kenneth Williams because the Maharaja, and was employed for Tomb Raider and Blade 2.’[1]

In fact, the clock was at all times going to fire up curiosity, not least from a visible perspective, however much more so when the story of its skeletal inhabitant was launched.

In line with Sotherby’s press launch, the full-sized mahogany coffin with elaborate inlay is rumoured to deal with the ‘stays of the younger Italian lover and secretary of the Countess of Rosslyn.’

Relying on the supply, the interred skeleton is both the husband or lover of the Countess of Rosslyn. When he died, the countess couldn’t bear to stay with out him and so carried his stays together with her – all in a really fancy clock – for the remainder of her days.

However is the identification of the skeleton appropriate? Unsurprisingly, opinions are divided. In line with Jeff Nisbet’s article for Atlantis Rising, ‘The Countess of Rosslyn on the time of the skeleton clock’s manufacture had been married to the 4th Earl from 1866 till his loss of life in 1890. Her personal loss of life, in 1933, would have offered the proper alternative for the remainder of the household to dump Grandma’s Italian paramour to the escapologist – at an eminently negotiable value, I’m positive.’ Nevertheless, the legitimacy of the story appears a little bit suspect within the Rosslyn timeline. ‘However the story of the clock’s connection to the Countess of Rosslyn appeared suspect. I knew of just one Scottish luminary who was intimately concerned with an Italian secretary – none apart from Mary, Queen of Scots.’[1]

Nisbet argues that this royal connection is way extra becoming, as ‘on March 9, 1566, secretary David Rizzio was stabbed to loss of life in Holyrood Palace for being the queen’s confidant and lover, and for being a Catholic. It has additionally been bandied about that he was the daddy of Mary’s son, the long run king of each Scotland and England.’ Moreover, it’s no nice leap of the creativeness to consider that Rizzio’s skeleton could have been preserved and celebrated, as with so many situations of Freemasonry and human stays of the time.

The coffin clock is a wonderful piece. The dial across the coffin lid is inlaid ivory on ebonised floor, with the bigger design depicting scythes, cranium and crossed bones, an hourglass and crossed spades, all being very clear symbols of the inevitability of loss of life. The designs are surrounded by snaking laurel leaves, giving the macabre design a considerably delicate really feel.

Imagine it or not, there are a handful of reported situations of rich ladies holding their husband’s stays in longcase clocks, in some instances, even after remarrying.

Ken Paul initially obtained the clock from a Hackney-based music corridor escapologist, but how this was integrated into his efficiency is a truth sadly misplaced to time.

The Rocky Horror skeleton clock, lot no. 1512, went on sale on fifteenth March 2002 and surpassed its £10,000 estimate significantly. Making the second highest value of the entire sale, the clock offered to an Italian personal purchaser for £35,000.

Whereas I don’t suppose we’ll be seeing the clock in a museum assortment any time quickly, the temptation to seize a noticed, some timber and begin on a duplicate mission is nearly overwhelming. Whereas I don’t have any deceased lovers to immortalise in a ticking coffin, I’d argue that it’s a dialog piece that each residence wants.

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