‘’Without the River Thames, London would not exist.’’ Mudlarking and London’s past and present. There is an unbreakable bond between the great metropolis and the mudlarkers who bring the treasures of bygone eras to light. From the children ‘’mudlarks’’ of the Victorian era to the ‘’explorers’’ of our times, mudlarking is a journey in time. Pre-historic beasts, votive offerings and coins, jewellery, remnants of the Roman times and the Viking threat. The traces of Britain following William the Conqueror, the might of the Church, the nightmare of the Black Death. Marvellous pilgrims’ badges depicting St George and the Dragon, toy knights made of pewter. The wealth and witchcraft obsession of the 16th and 17th century are demonstrated by beautiful artefacts, reminding us of the era of great discoveries and even greater crimes. Toys lost by the children who played by the river banks. Memento Mori rings dedicated to the ones who perished during the Great Fire. Love tokens. Beautiful Venetian glass beads. And pins. Let us not forget pins, such fascinating objects! A prisoner’s ball and chain originating from the floating prisons of the 18th century. The skull of a 12-year-old girl, dating back to the 1700s, was discovered in 2009. A victim of poverty and hunger. How bitterly ironic, standing side-by-side to golden shoe buckles and valuable cufflinks… Market tokens dating back to the 19th century. Beautiful green glass medicine bottles. Ornate clay pipes. Lead toys and ‘’’Frozen Charlotte’’ dolls. Victorian Santa Claus figures and snow babies. Artillery shells from the two World Wars. Service buttons and Tommy helmets. Fascinating modern-day rings that declare carelessness, frustration, anger. A fascinating book that offers us a generous glimpse of a turbulent and exciting past… ‘’London owes its very existence to the majestic Thames, and the city’s history is intimately interwoven with the river. It is simply not possible to understand London without first understanding the river and all of its quirks and foibles.’’ Adrian Evans, founder of the Thames Festival Trust

This is a fascinating and absorbing account of Thames mudlarking. Mudlarking started with the Victorian scavengers, often children, searching for anything they could sell in order to survive. There is now a Society of Mudlarks and Antiquarians who collaborate with The Museum of London to record the tens of thousands of finds. The range of artefacts is vast - fossils, coins, jewellery, pottery, glass etc. and the finds are outlined in chronological order in twelve chapters. The book is full of wonderful photographs of found artefacts along with an explanation of their history and the name of their finder. An engrossing read that makes me want to venture along the river in search of some 'treasure' myself. Thank you to Jason Sandy and Nick Stevens, Net Galley and Bloomsbury publishing for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

My thanks to the publishers for an advanced review copy of this sumptuously illustrated book. It is about the history of London’s lost treasures found by mudlarkers rather than a history of mudlarking itself, although the authors scrupulously attribute the treasures they highlight to their intrepid finders. I was interested to discover that you need a license from the Port of London Authority to mudlark these days and that there is a Society of Mudlarks and Antiquarians too, which was founded in 1980. Many of the finds described here mainly in chronological order are to be found in the Museum of London, which has a special relationship with today’s mudlarkers. The authors are also keen to promote a project, currently in concept, to found a Thames Museum. The Thames is a tidal river and its foreshore is exposed twice a day for two hours at a stretch. It is from the oxygen free mud of the foreshore that this fascinating array of accidentally and deliberately discarded objects has emerged. So claggy is the mud that it has preserved items which would long ago have decayed on land - medieval leather shoes with the points still stiffened with moss come to mind. The book introduces us to the beautiful Roman oil lamp found by Alan Suttie before taking us back into prehistory with giant shark and mammal teeth fossils and flint tools. Part of a Neolithic farmer’s skull radiocarbon dated to 3,600 BC leads on to the metal working wonders brought by the Beaker and Celtic peoples and the extraordinary Battersea shield and Waterloo helmet finds. Then we are back with the Romans, their dice and oil lamps, pots and hair clips, coins and brothel tokens not to mention a bronze bust of the Emperor Hadrian! Toys through the ages are another notable series of finds, including miniature but lethal guns as well as real swords, daggers, guns and knives. Trade tokens from the seventeenth century help us identify businesses destroyed by the Great Fire of London, while the eighteenth century gives us gloriously fancy shoe buckles as well as a prisoner’s ball and chain and the tragically malnourished skeleton of a twelve year old girl. Apart from pins, watch winders and wig curlers, there are hundreds of bottles - R White carbonated drinks bottles, Hamilton torpedo bottles, Codd bottles and poison bottles. The blitz is represented by buttons, helmets, artillery shell casings and Maconochie Brothers ration tokens and, of course, London’s present plight is delivering plenty of plastic and PPE to the mud of the Thames. I really enjoyed this short but brilliantly illustrated volume and can recommend it unreservedly.

I was expecting so much more. It's very short and I found quite a few things that were incorrect.I didn't learn anything new from this book. A missed opportunity.