The hazard of finding an old book in the house you just bought

Independent - A book has been returned to an Australian public library an estimated 150 years late after being found in a sealed fireplace during recent home renovations.

Antiquities of Athens, published in 1858, was returned to a library in the seaside town of Kiama last week after a local man discovered the text inside a tea crate, bricked into a disused fireplace.

“We’ve never had anything that old come back to us,” Kiama Library manager Michelle Hudson said.

“I follow lots of libraries on social media, and often you’ll get things that are maybe 30 or 40 years old when they’re cleaning out estates and stuff like that,” she added.

The late return fine would be about AU$28,000 (£14,600), allowing for inflation, Hudson said. That was calculated on the British three pence-a-week overdue fee that was printed on the inside cover of the book, along with a list of rules that applied when the library opened in 1872.