Auction News Archive

20.12.10. As usual, Wotton Auction Rooms holds the distinction of staging the last sale of the year containing books, on December 30th. You can find the 2011 Auction Dairy here, although it's currently fairly sparsely populated. 2010 has seen some improvement in earlier notification of dates by auctioneers, and I'm sure this is a trend that will continue in the coming year. It only remains to wish you all a most enjoyable festive season, and I will return to the keyboard on January 3rd.    
     If you are looking for a little book-related light relief over the holidays, Bookworm Droppings could raise a smile, and my Shelf : Life blog might fill an idle moment.  Add a comment

16.12.10. A rare cricket book described as “gold dust” has sold at auction for more than £150,000 ... more  Add a comment

15.12.10. Unearthed in a Scottish attic, this exceptional 17th century map, depicting old fishing settlements in Canada and North America is expected to attract international interest when offered at auction in Somerset in January ... more  Add a comment

13.12.10. A selection of highly sought after first editions of Ian Fleming’s legendary James Bond books are being sold by Gloucestershire auctioneers Dominic Winter on December 16th. Casino Royale, the book that introduced 007 to the world, is anticipated to be a highlight of the auction. This rare first edition with its original dust-jacket is expected to fetch £12,000.  Add a comment

07.12.10. Holy smoke - the famous first appearance of Batman is expected to fetch thousands of pounds at auction. The largest private collection of vintage American comics ever to be sold in the UK is going under the hammer at Dominic Winter ... more  Add a comment

02.12.10. Given the weather conditions across most of the country, I would strongly advise checking with the auctioneers before traveling to any sales in the coming week.  Add a comment

24.11.10. An early copy of a book signed by TV inventor John Logie Baird has raised over £1400 for charity. The 1926 edition of the book Television was anonymously donated to an Edinburgh Oxfam shop and was estimated to be worth £800 to £1000 ... more  Add a comment

22.11.10. On 25th November Bloomsbury Auctions  will sell the W. Somerset Maugham collection put together by Fred Zentner, former owner of the much missed Cinema Bookshop in Great Russell Street, London. Amongst the 346 lots of books and associated ephemera is an oil on canvas half-length portrait of the author by A.T. Haddon, which is estimated at £4,000 to £6,000.  Add a comment

16.11.10. Letters home from Sergeant Arthur Bradley who served on the Western Front for practically the entire course of the First World War are to be auctioned at Bonhams Printed Books, Maps and Manuscripts in London on 23 November ... more  Add a comment

11.11.10. One of the most romantic manuscripts of the medieval ages, the stories of chivalry, treachery and passion of King Arthur, his knights and his faithless wife, is to be auctioned next month and could fetch up to £2m ... more  Add a comment

27.10.10. Two iconic works -- one billed as the most expensive book in the world and the other the most important book in all of English Literature -- will go under the hammer at a Sotheby's auction on December 7th ... more  Add a comment

21.10.10. Hundreds of books and journals which have been "gathering dust" in Gloucestershire's libraries are due to be sold by the Cotswold Auction Company in Cheltenham on 26 October ..more   Details of all the books included in the sale can be found here. Add a comment

07.10.10. It has been one of the most read books for more than a century and a half and now a rare copy of Wuthering Heights, once owned by a wealthy Norfolk parson, is set to fetch thousands of pounds at Sotheby's sale on October 28th ... more  Add a comment

05.10.10. The Cotswold Auction Company's sale on October 8th at Bingham Hall includes a "very large quantity (of books) covering all subjects including Miltaria, Topography, Literature, Natural History, History, Reference, Novels etc".  Add a comment

01.10.10. This autumn, Sotheby’s will offer an important and rare Qur’an manuscript dated 1660 and dedicated to The Sultan of Brunei. The manuscript will form part of the sale of A Princely Collection – Treasures from the Islamic World which take place in London on Tuesday, 5 October, 2010. Estimated at £60,000 80,000, the Qur’an is remarkable not only for its royal dedication, its named scribe, place of origin and its early date, but also for the important light it sheds on artistic and decorative styles in the region of South East Asia. Only two further Qur’ans copied at Kota Batu have appeared at auction in the last 12 years ... more  Add a comment

20.09.10. Rare photographic albums left in a charity shop could fetch £5,000 when they are sold at auction by Christie’s. The albums, containing photographs of 19th century Argentina, were discovered by volunteer Caroline Ingram at the Oxfam shop in Jesmond, Newcastle ... more  Add a comment

03.09.10. I'm about to take a belated summer holiday and will be out of the office from September 4th - 19th, so no further news or updates until September 20th.  Add a comment

21.07.10. Bloomsbury's Natural History Books, Manuscripts & Watercolours sale on September 23rd includes the second part of Mike Walpole's botanical library. A highlight will be The Greate Herball by Joannes Platearius. An extremely rare black-letter herbal, it was printed by Jhon Kynge, and only three copies have come to auction in the last 30 years. The estimate is £4,000-6,000.   Add a comment

19.07.10. The star lot of Dominic Winter's Printed Books & Maps sale on July 21st has to be the first edition of Oscar Wildes's Salomé, signed by the author, and estimated at £20,000-30,0000. More affordable and interesting to me is lot 339, The Bristol Wonder. A broadside published in 1788 it describes a are type of conjoined twin in which the twins share a head and face but have two bodies. No other copy is known and it's estimated at £500-800.  Add a comment

09.07.10. I'm out of the office for most of next week, so don't expect to see any news or updates until 19.07.10.  Add a comment

08.07.10. The star lot of Sotheby's English Literature, History, Children’s Books & Illustrations Sale on 15 July, is perhaps the ultimate Sherlock Holmes rarity: a copy of the first printing of A Study in Scarlet inscribed by the author (one of only two such copies known). You can watch the preview video here, and the estimate is £250,000 - £400,000.  Add a comment

05.07.10. A highlight of Bloomsbury's auction on July 8th is lot 448. An original pen and ink drawing by Ernest Shepard entitled 'He swung off the path and plunged into the untrodden places of the wood', it depicts Mole in woods (pp.39 of Wind in the Willows). It's acompanied by a presentation copy of Wind in the Willows, inscribed by Shepard to Paline Baynes, and the estimated at £8000 – £12000.  Add a comment

28.06.10. John Nicholson's Book Sale on July 6th kicks off with a 14 lot map section, but a highlight of the sale is a copy of A Short Relation of the River Nile, of its source and Current; of its overflowing the campagnia of Aegypt, till it Runs into the Mediterranean, and of other curiosities, by Jeronimo Lobo. Printed for John Martin in 1673. It's described as being in full polished calf, and has an estimate of £800-1400.  Add a comment

08.06.10. Copies of the first four editions of Wisden, the world famous Bible of Cricket, are for sale at Bonhams Book Sale in Oxford on June 29. They are being sold on behalf of Oxfam, as are many other items in the auction ... more  Add a comment

02.06.10. Sotheby's has announced it was to sell what its specialist Peter Selley described as "the most impressive collection of English literature assembled by any British collector in the last 30 or 40 years. The collection is estimated to be worth £8m-£15m, and includes a signed copy of A Christmas Carol ... more  Add a comment

28.05.10. A lost letter from Lawrence of Arabia, which mentions his move to Lincolnshire, has sold for £33,000 at auction in Scotland. The letter to Lord Rennell was found in a signed copy of Lawrence's book Seven Pillars of Wisdom which was taken into an auctioneers in Edinburgh .... more  Add a comment

18.05.10. A library of books described as an Edwardian time capsule and worth up to £200,000 will be put under the hammer on May 27th. The collection of 3,000 books is being auctioned by Bloomsbury Auctions, as the Bath manor house in which they were housed is itself up for sale - for £6 million. .... more  Add a comment

05.05.10. An extraordinary collection of memorabilia of the life of Sir Winston Churchill is to go on sale at Christie's, featuring his official engagements diary during the Second World War, candid letters to colleagues - and one unsmoked cigar .... more  Add a comment

30.04.10. A forthcoming Bloomsbury Auctions sale in London means James Bond collectors can expect more valuable Ian Fleming first editions to hit the auction block. Scheduled to take place on Thursday, 13 May, the auction will feature 37 James Bond lots in total, including Fleming’s Moonraker, Dr. No and Thunderball - many of them signed.... more  Add a comment

16.04.10. A Trip To The Highlands of Viti Levu, which was discovered in an Oxfam bookshop has raised more than £37,000 at auction for the charity. The book of photographs, describing two Victorian scientists' quest to find their long-lost brother in Fiji in 1881, was valued at £2,000 to £3,000 by Bonhams ... more  Add a comment

08.04.10. A text book written to teach German school children about Britain ahead of the Nazi invasion has come to light. The work portrays Adolf Hitler as a "great peacemaker" and even suggested Britain had sought an alliance with Germany. The book will be sold by a private collector at Mullock's auctioneers in Ludlow on April 15th and is expected to fetch £150- £200 ... more  Add a comment

30.03.10. A rare signed first edition of George Orwell's first full-length work has sold for £86,000 at auction. The immaculate copy of Down And Out In Paris And London - complete with dust jacket - had a pre-sale guide price of £2,500-£3,500 ... more  Add a comment

15.03.10. A 180 year old book containing one of the first images ever taken of Singapore has sold for £43,000 - after being rescued from a bonfire ... more  Add a comment

09.03.10. For any diehard fan of The Wind in the Willows it would be a dream come true – owning a first edition copy signed by its Edinburgh author Kenneth Grahame. Now that dream could become a reality, when the rare book goes up for auction in Bonhams on 23rd March, with a guide price of up to £5,000 ... more  Add a comment

04.03.10. The Rules of Holy Living from 1676 urges ladies to "abstain from wanton laughter" and even orders them not to wear see-through clothes. While the guide may seem incompatable with modern society, it is expected to be the subject of a fierce bidding war when it is auctioned by Hansons on March 25th ... more  Add a comment

01.03.10. A man who saved vintage railway memorabilia from the scrapheap to amass one of the finest collections of its type, is to make his family nearly £1 million when it is sold by Morphets on March 4th ... more  Add a comment

23.02.10. On March 4th Cheffins will sell a naval log written by Charles Woods on HMS Winchester between 1834-1838. The log details a barbaric sounding ceremony performed on the crossing of the equator in which any seamen younger than 30, and who have never crossed the line before, was given an initiation. The young seaman was brought blindfolded before King Neptune and his Queen where he was tarred, 'shaved', and forced to drink salt water. Wood's log also illustrates the ceremony and carries an estimate of £4,000-6,000. The sale also includes a collection of Titanic Memorabilia.  Add a comment

22.02.10. Aidan Foley's auction tomorrow in Sixmilebridge, Co. Clare, Ireland has a large selection of books of Irish interest. These were a late entry and were not listed on any adverts. Further details here.  Add a comment

16.02.10. Quaritch bookcases make £22,000. The two cabinets, which measure 8ft 10in x 6ft 1in (2.71m x 1.86m), are thought to have been originally commissioned as one large bookcase for the company’s Grafton Street rooms when then firm moved there in 1907 ... more  Add a comment

09.02.10. Five pictures depicting the story of Beauty and the Beast, which are believed to be the original draft images by illustrator Walter Crane, will be sold by Chippenham Auction Rooms on February 20th ... more  Add a comment

04.02.10. A detailed look at book auction results for 2009 reveals that virtually every important number was down. The most telling number - median sales price - was down. Sell through rates were down. The ratio of items sold above the high estimate to those sold below the low estimate was down. The number of auctions held and number of items offered were down. So why are we celebrating these seemingly woeful results? The answer is that these declines, particularly in terms of median price, were surprisingly small ... more  Add a comment

27.01.10. Gloucestershire County Council will give collectors another chance to buy unused books from the Hartland Collection, when they are sold by The Cotswold Auction Company on February 2nd ... more   Add a comment

27.01.10. In addition to their Golfing Memorabilia Sale on 30th January, Mulock's are holding a two day Golf Trade Fair & Show, starting on the 29th. It's anticipated that golfing material will be on offer from the both the trade and private collectors.  Add a comment

14.01.10.A collection of rare travel books, including one which belonged to Captain Cook, has fetched more than £300,000 at auction. ... more  Add a comment

13.01.10. Great Escape camp logbook sells for £3,200 ... more  Add a comment

11.01.10. A sketchbook belonging to a 19th century female artist known for her depictions of military scenes has been discovered, and will be sold at Hansons auction on January 21 in Derby. Its pre-sale estimate is £400-600 ... more  Add a comment

01.01.10. Welcome to our 2010 Book Auction Diary. One of the first dedicated book auctions of the new year is Lyon and Turnbull's sale of Books, Maps & Manuscripts, in Edinburgh on January 13th. As usual this sale will include a wide variety of material ranging from manuscripts, ephemera, and bindings, to modern first editions, and children's books.  Add a comment

News from 2009