I think another good option would to be have some of the text be locked behind a lore check. Have Identify give you a basic history and then have to pay a bard or someone to unlock the rest of the item's history. It would give more utility to bards and characters that invest in a lore skill and people that don't care could just ignore it. Maybe even have it's selling price go up after fully identifying its history.
Actually I'm not sure how identifying and lore works in 5th edition. I think I'll go check that out.
