APPRAISER: Is this one of your enemies, Eddie?
GUEST: No, not quite, no.
APPRAISER: Where did you get it?
GUEST: I bought it at a local auction. They were saying that it was a Tibetan piece, and I didn't really know what it was, but it was only going for like $100, $125.
APPRAISER: Well, it is what we call a tourist piece. It's not old. It's made as decoration, and rather macabre decoration, as you can see. The tradition of mounting a human skull and using it as a drinking vessel goes back thousands of years. And in fact, this is an imitation of a very early one.
GUEST: Okay.
APPRAISER: This stone here, which in fact is synthetic...
GUEST: Plastic.
APPRAISER: Yeah, it's just plastic put in-- but it's-- the idea of this is, they would put a stone in the center there called a bezoar stone, which is a secretion that they find in the stomach of goats. And it's a small, almond-shaped stone, and the belief was that these were antidotes to poison. And the idea was, if you had any enemies and they'd given you poisoned wine, this would act as the antidote against it. It's worth a few hundred dollars, but certainly, it's got to be one of the most bizarre things we've seen on the ROADSHOW.
GUEST: It was quite different, I agree.
APPRAISER: Yes.
GUEST: Thank you.
APPRAISER: Thanks for coming in.
