Books & Periodicals

Once described as “one of the rarest dog books printed in the English language”, a copy of Cynographia Britannica: Consisting of Coloured Engravings of Various Breeds of Dogs existing in Great Britain sold at $14,000 (£10,525) at Christie’s New York (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) on June 14.

An early 17th century work on …the Whole Practise of Artillery made a record sum in sale held by Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) of Leyburn.

Sold for $32,000 (£24,060) at Christie’s New York (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) on June 14 was an Edison Universal Stock Ticker.

Two 1859 firsts of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species…, neither in what could be called good condition, made very strong prices in recent weeks. This is a book nowadays so desirable that such shortcomings can be overlooked.

An inscription reading “For Mrs Oliver, from Beatrix Potter – with kind regards & best wishes for Christmas 1901” was a welcome bonus on a copy of the first, privately printed edition of The Tale of Peter Rabbit.

ATG’s calendar of book auctions taking place in the UK and Ireland from July 9-19.

The antiquarian book trade is lobbying for changes to the proposed EU law designed to crack down on imports of cultural goods ‘more than 250 years old’.

Running to just over a hundred pages and containing numerous illustrations of ships, figureheads and portrait busts, an accounts ledger kept by a Cumbrian shipbuilder has gone to a local museum.

Fabrizio Govi of Libreria antiquaria Alverto Govi (Italy) and Govi Rare Books (New York) was elected vice-president of ILAB this year.

Some 240 lots in a recent two-day book sale in Norfolk came from the library of local authors and collectors David and Patricia Cory, with science fiction, fantasy, ghost stories and crime fiction very much in evidence.

Comprising some 3000 books that range in date from 1473-1840, one of the finer collection of books on agriculture ever assembled will be dispersed by Forum Auctions in a July 10-11 sale that runs to more than 800 lots.

ATG’s calendar of book auctions taking place in the UK and Ireland from July 3-12, 2018.

Dating from 1944, the ink, watercolour and gouache artwork shown belowwas made by Russell H Tandy to illustrate the cover of The Secret in the Old Attic, the 21st of Carolyn Keene’s ‘Nancy Drew’ mysteries.

From her Dorset cottage, artist and print-maker Rena Gardiner (1929-99) produced more than 40 guidebooks to historic places, buildings and the countryside, all of which she wrote, illustrated with drawings made directly onto litho plates and printed herself.

The mammoth disposal of the Aristophil collections of historic manuscripts began last week with a premium-inclusive €17.6m series of seven June auctions offered over four days at Drouot (June 15 and 18-20).