The Provenance of No. 17

Chassis No. 17 — a 1953 Jaguar C-Type — passed through six hands between 1961 and 2003. We know the first four. The middle two are a problem.

This is the inaugural entry in The Provenance Desk, a column in which I work through the documentary gaps in machines of particular consequence. I don’t pretend to authority. I pretend, at most, to method.

The method, briefly:

1. Begin with the chassis plate. Photograph it under raking light. The stamping will tell you more than any subsequent paint can hide.
2. Compare the engine number to the chassis number. A discrepancy is not necessarily a problem. An unexplained discrepancy always is.
3. Find the period photographs. Race meetings of the era were photographed exhaustively; absence is itself evidence.
4. Write to the previous keepers. Most will reply. Some will reply in detail.
5. Reconcile.

No. 17 will yield to this method. I expect it to take a year.

— RHYS