Inspired by yesterday

This is my 'Fums Up'

I was inspired to blip this after yesterday's Remembrance Day. I have owned this for a few years and I polished it for the first time yesterday.

This is a charm...the hoop at the top is missing and this would be suspended on a chain. It is a real World War I love token. I have a real interest in World War I as a scholar (if you can call it that) of Wilfred Owen's poetry in a different lifetime.

This 'charm' has moveable arms so that the arms touch the wood of the head- touch wood for good luck. The chest bears the 'FUMSUP' mark and on the back of each is a registration mark. They are solid silver and change hands for silly sums on ebay at the moment. I bought mine many years ago before the craze on ebay began. I think this poem sums the FUMSUP nicely:

Behold in me the birth of luck,
Two charms combined TOUCH WOOD-FUMSUP.
My head is made of wood most rare
My thumbs turn up to touch me there.
To speed my feet they've Cupid's wings,
They'll help true love 'mongst other things.
Proverbial is my power to bring
Good luck to you in everything.
I'll bring good luck to all away,
Just send me to a friend today.

from sandysvintagecharms.co.uk (along with pictures of many other fumsups)

"The Fumsup character is believed to be a nod back to the Gladiator days in Rome when the Emperor would decide if a Gladiator would live or die. Supposedly a 'thumbs up' would mean he would live and a 'thumbs down' would mean death. Historians have since proven this to be wrong but when this Fumsup character emerged in the late Victorian period I expect they still believed the original stories.
So why the strange spelling of the name Fumsup? I have a theory. The majority of the Fumsup charms have registered design numbers. For the character to be registered it would need a name that could also be registered and the name 'thumbs up' couldn't be because it was a universal saying so they spelt it differently."

I think I may have reached my word limit....