One Antiques Roadshow guest was left speechless as she made show history alongside furniture expert Christopher Payne. In an episode dating back to 1998 and filmed in Hull, a BBC show guest turned up with a chest of drawers she believed to date back to the eighteenth century - but was soon shocked to learn the truth.

The chest had dead spiders collected in the corners, with Payne explaining: "The spiders don't necessarily guarantee authenticity, but when you look at the underneath of this and how it's been constructed, there's clearly been a lot of reconstruction of the feet and the blocking. The way it's done is not even really an attempt to make it look like an old one, but this is quite common because a lot of this worn-out furniture has replaced feet."

He went on to explain: "What I like is this very small size, and the market likes the small size too. It's ostensibly Queen Anne, George I, 1700-1720."

The guest was keen to learn the history of the item, explaining: "The story in the family is that it came into the family with my grandfather's grandmother, who was a housekeeper at a big house in Staffordshire.

"When she married the gardener she was supposed to have been given this as a wedding present. Now my grandfather was born in 1854 and it was his grandmother, so that would take it back to about 1820, 1830..."

Payne told her: "Firstly, it's a well made drawer. Nice dry oak, exactly what one would expect from the early eighteenth century. But when you look a bit more closely, the fineness of the dovetails is not brilliant, it's not as well done as I'd like it to be. I'm suspicious about this staining on the edge here - the stain is the same on the top as along the dovetails, and I have the suspicion somebody has done that to give it a bit of age and wear.

"You have to ask yourself, does that look like nearly 300 years of wear? I don't think it does at all, I'm afraid. When I look at this, I think this is something made at the very earliest at the turn of this century."

At learning the piece was only around 100 years old - at best - the guest was clearly shocked, and Payne soon delivered another blow: "I think it's... I'm going to have to use a word I don't think I've ever used on the Roadshow, I think it's a fake."

The guest asked: "Oh! Not a reproduction, a real fake?" only for the appraiser to say: "I think the person who made this intended for it to look old, whereas the reproduction pieces of the 1920s and 1930s were always making things which even to the vaguely trained eye don't look old. This, you need to look at really quite carefully."

Thankfully he had some good news too, explaining the item would likely fetch a retail value of around £3,000 - around £6,000 in today's money.

The guest, clearly emotional, replied: "Oh well that's lovely! We've always wanted to know the history of it and whether it was old or not, so that's settled it."