Collectables

On offer at the Rare Books, Manuscripts, Maps & Photographs sale held by Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh on September 28 is an anti-slavery broadside: 'The Sorrows of Yamba, or, the Negro Woman’s Lamentation. To the Tune of Hosier’s Ghost'.

The 264 English gold coins in the so-called Ellerby Hoard, uncovered by a Yorkshire family while re-laying a floor in an 18th century home, range from the reign of James I to George I.

Away from London, some exceptional coin sales coming up in Europe include a number of outstanding British issues.

Assembled over five decades by private collector Martin Burtt, The Glaisdale Agricultural Library on offer at North Yorkshire saleroom Tennants on September 30 includes volumes by the great agricultural writers of the 16th to 19th centuries.

Thousands of items are available to buy from dealers online. Here we pick out one that caught our eye this week.

Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions.

Though around 30% of the 150 lots remained unsold, no fewer than eight of those offered in a held by Christie’s (15/20/14.5% buyer’s premium) in London brought six-figure bids.

'Hortus sanitatis' (Gart der Gesundheit, Augsburg 1485), considered among the most important early works of natural history and one of the first scientific incunabula in a vernacular language, is on offer at Munich saleroom Ketterer Kunst on November 28.

Catalogued as a ‘very good, complete copy in original condition of the first really modern scientific book published in England’, a 1600 first edition (Peter Short) of De Magnete by William Gilbert is estimated at £10,000-15,000 in Forum Auction’s Fine Books, Manuscripts & Works on Paper sale in London on September 29.

This scarlet and navy woollen cape sold in an Essex auction is sewn with the numerous cloth regimental badges that were given to Esme Kathleen Robinson (d.2017) by the soldiers she treated in Oxfordshire as a member of the Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) during the Second World War.

A lot offering Action Man outfits and accessories from the flock hair period c.1970 sold for 100 times the low estimate at a Devon saleroom thanks to a considerable rarity it contained.

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including a copy of The Beano No 1 selling for a five-figure sum at auction.

A well-preserved and boxed version of the 1960s Japanese Masudaya Machine Man robot was the highest flyer in the Morphy Auctions (20% buyer’s premium) August 9-10 toys and collectables sale in Denver, Pennsylvania.

A small collection of the works of TS Eliot offered in a Canterbury Auction Galleries (22.5% buyer’s premium) sale of August 6-7 included what appears to have been a 1943, first US printing of his 'Four Quartets'.

Bertoia’s sale of the collection of Bill and Stevie Weart will be held over two days in Vineland, New Jersey, on September 8-9.

Nineteenth and early 20th century novelty silver continues to be one of the strengths of the collecting category.

Thousands of items are available to buy from dealers online. Here we pick out one that caught our eye this week.