Collectables

Though the splendid but incomplete copy of Jakob Christoph Trew’s 'Hortus nitidissims… floribus' previewed in ATG No 2018 got close to the high estimate in selling at £85,000 as part of the opening, natural history section of a recent London sale, a number of other top lots failed to find buyers.

Although Charles Dickens is often credited with creating the ‘modern’ Christmas, some of the recognition should go to John Leech.

Containing numerous diagrams, a manuscript manual on 18th century shipbuilding techniques and practices sold for £3600 in a recent sale.

Extinct for 65 million years, dinosaurs continue to rule the world of children visiting the National History Museum, of multi-million dollar movie makers – and of bidders at the Evolution Sales at Summers Place Auctions (25% buyer’s premium).

Our regular listing of British and Irish book auctions.

A 1637 first edition of 'New English Canaan…' was one of the homegrown highlights of a sale held by Christie’s New York (25/20/13.5% buyer’s premium).

Madeleine Neave, curator of The Antique Breadboard Museum, has published a book describing her extensive collection of boards, butter knives and butter churners.

Losses narrowed for stamps, coins and medals business Stanley Gibbons in the six months to September 30.

Personal devotional prayer books, known as a Book of Hours, were popular among the wealthy and powerful in late medieval Europe. Illuminated with miniature paintings depicting the life of Christ, the Virgin Mary and saints, they were sometimes personalised for the patrons who commissioned them.

Invented in the 19th century but outmoded by word processors then computers, typewriters are now having a resurgence in the collecting world.

The height of fashion nearly three centuries ago, this 18th century doll’s dress caught the eye at C&T’s (20% buyer’s premium) specialist sale in Tunbridge Wells.

Less often seen than Suffragette propaganda and considerably less PC these days, a brass and enamel fob badge for the National League for Opposing Woman had its international admirers at Ipswich auction house Lockdales (19.5% buyer’s premium).

Possibly dating from the late 16th or early 17th century, a Spanish text manuscript version of Andrea Alciato’s 1531 'Emblemata', the first and most frequently reprinted emblem book, sold for $9000 (£7030) at Swann (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) in New York.

Book dealer John Lawson joined EM Lawson & Co, the firm that his father had started at Sutton Coldfield in 1921, when he was demobbed from national service in the RAF in 1952.

Differing echoes of the First World War attracted bidders at Dominic Winter’s (20% buyer’s premium) Cirencester auction in the run-up to Remembrance Sunday.

The leading contenders in the December 12 General Election are struggling to land any meaningful blows on each other, despite being more than happy to be photographed in boxing rings.