Fine Arts: Object of desire

What better gift for a newborn than an antique silver rattle? The Silver Shop in Dublin’s Powerscourt Centre has a beauty with a coral teether, made in Birmingham in 1869, priced €395.

Babies have been a-rattling since the dawn of time. The earliest known rattle, made of clay and filled with little balls, dates from the Iron Age. The ancient Greeks loved them, but Aristotle had a somewhat jaundiced view, recommending the rattle “to keep ...