so i'm not sure exactly what caused this problem. i'm playing diablo (v1.0, i.e. no patch) with hellfire installed, the patch for hellfire, and a no-cd patch (the less i use my laptop's cd drive the better... i've already replaced it once).
so i had just finished the valor quest and decided to start a new game. in the new game i looked at my inventory and noticed an interesting glitch:

somehow my harlequin crest got turned into a book of firewall that's also a butcher's cleaver. i reloaded my old game and started another new one and the same thing happened.
whereas i'm mainly amused by this glitch, i am slightly concerned that should i start a new game (with this character), this may happen to a valuable item that is not easily replaceable.