A battered teddy bear turned out to be worth an eyewatering sum of money as a guest brought it for appraisal in a classic episode of Antiques Roadshow. The BBC are currently rerunning vintage episodes of the show from their archives and on Monday, February 13, they broadcast an episode from season 24, filmed in Hartlepool around 2001. Hosted by Michael Aspel, it saw a young man around bring a rather tatty cuddly toy to expert Bunny Campione to ask her opinion on it. Explaining his aunt had bought it for half a crown around three decades previous, he told her it had been a dog toy.

"Did she buy it for any particular reason?" Campione asked him. "Well she actually bought it, funny story, for a dog to play with," he laughed. Campione clarified this with him clearly incredulous someone would have bought such an object for that purpose. "She [the dog] used to pinch other babies' toys, which is quite amusing. So she bought that," he confirmed

"Is that why this has been eaten away?" she asked, pointing to a very badly damaged hand on the toy. The guest sheepishly admitted: "Yes, that was done by my dog, not hers, when it was a puppy."

"Well, he's also got a hole in his ear, obviously, where she pulled out this stud," the guest agreed this was the case, saying she was worried the dog would swallow it and choke on it.

"And isn't she lucky that it only did that damage, because this chap is a very, very important bear," Campione confirmed.

"He's by the firm of Steiff in Germany, and he has the centre seam here, which shows he's one of out of seven," she said, explaining the toy's heritage.

She continued: "In other words, they had seven bolts of this lovely mohair plush, and every time they came to the end, they could make half a teddy.

"In other words they made six without the seam and one with. So he's slightly rarer. He's got these lovely boot button eyes, the original eyes not eaten by the dog.

"Have you got any idea what he's worth?" she asked, to which the guest answered in the negative.

"Well, I think you'll have to break it to your aunt quite softly, because if he were to go into a teddy bear auction, he would make in the region of between £3,500 to £4000 pounds. Stunned, the guest laughed, asking: "£4,000 for the Teddy Bear?" which Campione confirmed.