It talks about comparison to other portraits of Shakespeare, but as far as I know there are no depictions of Shakespeare confirmed to have been made in his lifetime.
> It is one of only two works of art definitively identifiable as a depiction of the poet
> ... commentators have used the Droeshout print as a standard by which to judge other portraits alleged to depict Shakespeare.
A lot apparently goes into establishing the authenticity of portraits. As a conservator, he does a lot of work in the background that isn't always conveyed in the videos.
Sometimes the outcome of his restoration efforts is to communicate to the client that the painting is either a copy, or may have history but the subject isn't who they thought it was.
No actual comment on this particular story, but the little bit I've learned of the art community is that they put a huge amount of effort into confirming provenance. The history of the painting.
So if a lot of experts in the field are raising doubts, it's probably worth examining their statements.
Like archaeologists, most want to make a major find. It's career making. But that also requires being highly sceptical of new claims.
Other conservators are less than complimentary of him and he deleted the PVA video along with a bunch of others.
Later in article:
> if it were proven to be the prolific playwright, it could be worth "anywhere from £100m to £200m".
Well done BBC. I still remember when you were different.
The Crown Jewels are genuinely priceless. Yes, “priceless” is common hyperbole, but the BBC claim to integrity and quality reporting just made me think that they might consider a more accurate title.
We’ve come so far in normalising casual mis-reporting that this argument even needs to be backed up.
Now, people from other cultures may just consider both rubbish and melt down the Crown Jewels for the raw materials - or hang the portrait over their fireplace.
Priceless is always in the eye of the beholder.
I'm surprised I seem to be in the minority in disagreeing with the idea that "everything has a price", as if it's just a matter of finding a number high enough.
Every sale is between two parties, the price is simply any agreed value that would result in a sale. So it's not just what someone is willing to pay, but also what someone is willing to sell for. If both those ranges don't overlap, no sale.
I would argue a better definition of priceless is one in which no value could ever be discovered for which a sale could exist. Not because it is too high, but because there are constraints to that price equation (as governed by both parties) that overlap in such a way as there is simply no solution.
Examples are obvious, but in the case of the the Crown Jewels, they are priceless because of their identity and their inseparable significance to the United Kingdom. There is no price for which decision makers could agree on and keep their jobs (or their head), to the extent that a sale could ever exist. In the eyes of the public, the Monarchy itself would be at stake. In that sense the Crown Jewels are priceless, literally without price.
If this painting were genuine i don't think there's anything that would stop the seller from being able to agree on a price that would enable them to sell it.
Look, if you read “priceless” in a headline about a painting and think it literally means that the painting has a vast, unknown value that can never be determined, that’s on you.
Suppose an imaginary private buyer was willing to buy the Crown Jewels for £5 billion. It's absurd to believe that the Royal Family would even entertain such an offer because (a) it's not like they would be incentivised by the money and (b) it would be a remarkable act of self-harm to the extent the deal would be so shockingly unpopular that it would only serve to threaten the Royal Family itself. So why on Earth would they agree to that? Responding "OK, how about £10 billion?" does nothing to resolve that calculus. In that sense, no price exists for which they could be sold - they are literally priceless.
The idea they "are worth between 3 and 5 billion pounds" is so daft that I'm pretty sure you just got that from ChatGPT.
Actually for fun i just asked: I got a material valuation of the stones at "several billion pounds if assessed purely by their material worth" (so about the same as your claim), but that "their true worth is incalculable".
What's another word for a price that's incalculable?