To be surprised so many signet rings are "fake"

[shocka]

I'm from an Irish family so most of my forebears had no money, and those that did had nothing of the sort of money found in the South East.

When I went up to Cambridge I was shocked by the number of people my age wearing signet rings. I assumed they were all from really posh English families. I was slightly envious in a way, that people had such a good knowledge of their own family background that a signet ring had been passed down.

It was only until years later that when discussing with other people what their signet ring meant to them, that I found out so many people had either bought them, found a crest online for their surname, or the design was just their initials or similar. I had genuinely thought all these people wearing them were actually posh and not just wearing it to try look the part.

Well, that's enough internet for me for today.

They scream DelBoy to me.

All very Blackadder:

• Captain Blackadder: "I then leapt on the opportunity to test you. I asked if he'd been to one of the great universities: Oxford, Cambridge, or Hull."
• Nurse Mary: "Well?"
• Captain Blackadder: "You failed to spot that only two of those are great universities."
• Nurse Mary: "You swine!"
• General Melchett: "That's right! Oxford's a complete dump!" (An improvised line by Stephen Fry, who attended Cambridge, whereas Rowan Atkinson went to Oxford)

Nah, the Del Boy rings are sovereigns.

This. I have never assumed someone with a signet ring is posh.

In fact my first assumption would be chav/working class.

This is definitely more 80s/90s Lissy Duke than posh

@LaLaBlandit’s what people who went to Oxbridge learn to say. You go “up” to Oxford and Cambridge.

A woman with whom I studied (also at Cambridge - yay me and my planet-brain, also despite my Irish ancestry) acquired one but her dad was also originally of Irish stock: it was deffo a nouveau riche thing.

Wins the thread. 😂😂😂

OP, you did so well to win a place at Cambridge, despite your dirt-poor Irish ancestry.

I went up to Cambridge as well. I mean, from where I live in the south east with all my stashes of money, everything is up isn't it?

@NimbleTaupeTigerare you napping in your money-bed right now; mattress stuffed with fifties?

I have designed one for my son when he follows in the family footsteps by gaining a place to read Land Economy at my old college.

A type of Psoriatic arthritis apparently.

Signet rings are the opposite of posh where I come from!

I think Americans wear college signet rings.

The Kray twins wore signet rings. They definitely weren’t posh.

If you like them get one - initials / a favourite animal …

There are rich people outside the South-East y'know! Even Oop North. There is a load of poverty in the South East - especially parts of London. Sick of this North/South nonsense. (no chip on shoulder here!)

I am! How did you know? 😅

What sort of year war this that you were walking around Cambridge stunned by all the fake posh people wearing heraldic family jewellery? Because signet rings, and definitely sovereign rings, have been the height of lower class chav since at least 1987. If you're female you also need a pair of "shoplifter earrings", which are gold hoops so big it looks like you're missing a parrot.

Wotcher treacle, they got some nice signet rings dahn the market, couple of nicker a pop. Too right, sunshine, see yer dahn the Queen Vic at lunchtime

In the best circles, it was always going up to London too, even if you were driving from Brum. (Unlikely….make that York, or Cheltenham, perhaps!)
From your London townhouse you would go down to the (Derbyshire) country pile.
“Up to town” always meant to London, from any compass point.
(‘Top Ranking’ was not anticipated)

Where do you stand on an English person wearing a Claddagh ring bought because they liked it?

@Millytanteyeah posh people with whom I’m acquainted always say “We have a place in TOWN” when talking about their London townhouse.

Is this why it's called being sent down when you're told to leave? I seem to remember seeing this in a few period dramas

Yes, exactly. One goes up to university as a new undergrad and comes down when they graduate.

The going up to London comes from the advent of the railways. The ‘up’ line was the line towards London (initially on the GWR line, which, ironically, runs east-west, so level with London from there to Bristol), so you also had an ‘up’ platform and a ‘down’ platform on stations with two lines. They re still referred to like this in railway circles.

(For clarity and reputation management: I am not a railway nerd or train spotter, just a buildings historian who has to know stuff like this).