Antiques Roadshow viewers left unable to sleep after freaky dolls get valued

Viewers of Antiques Roadshow were left horrified after some terrifying items made an appearance on the show.

There are certainly some truly haunting artefacts out there, such as books which are bound in human skin, or items owned by infamous serial killers.

BBC

However, these items gave off a wholly different aura of creepiness. They may not have any direct occult connections, but you could be forgiven for finding them straight up terrifying.

The items in question were a pair of ventriloquist's dummies - already off to a good start on the creepiness scale.

Not only that, but the look of them is extremely haunting. I can't decide if I'd rather have them tucked away in a cupboard or out where I could see them. Problem is, if you know they're in the cupboard who knows what they might be getting up to when you're not looking.

The show introduced the items, saying: "These [the dummies] were my father's, the magic tricks and everything were actually my grandad's.

"They are all original magic circles, they're the first tricks that were ever made I think."

Even expert Mark Hill was creeped out by the dolls, saying: "These things absolutely terrify me!"

The dolls were made out of celluloid, and would have been part of a specialised way of producing them, Mark explained. He said they would likely have been made in the 1960s.

BBC

He said: "This was generations of families reusing tools from above."

The guest who had brought the dolls on revealed that they were called Fred and William, and shocked viewers when she revealed that Fred was wearing her father's wig.

Viewers were left terrified by the dolls, and took to social media to communicate just how horrifying they had found the two dummies.

One wrote: "Put them in a box and burn them. Don’t care how much they are worth."

Another posted: "I'm not f**king sleeping tonight."

A third wrote: "I can see why this episode of #AntiquesRoadshow is after the watershed, between the ventriloquist dummies and the creepy nodding cats I won't sleep for a week."

In the end, Mark estimated that Fred and William would be likely to fetch around £70 to £100 each at an auction.

Presumably in addition to the usual auction fees that would include the cost of hiring an exorcist.