Bonhams

Skinner of Boston – now part of Bonhams – has appointed Benjamin Mini as director of the rugs and carpets department. He will also serve as the regional director of the auction house for Maine and northern New England.

Polar material in a travel and exploration themed sale held on March 2 by Bonhams (27.5/25/20/14.5% buyer’s premium) produced a bid of £24,000 for a letter that Robert Falcon Scott wrote to a friend, Lady Goodrich, about his planned British Antarctic Expedition of 1910.

A round up of the latest announcements of new roles and moves.

The original doctorate certificate awarded to Albert Einstein by the University of Zurich in 1905 will be a highlight offering at Bonhams in New York.

“It’s not often we offer for sale a library of nearly 200 volumes by the same publisher as a single lot – and certainly not one that fits in a small suitcase.”

In the wake of new sanctions on Russia, auction houses Sotheby’s, Christie’s and Bonhams have cancelled sales of Russian art in London scheduled for June.

Although Roamer fell victim to the ‘quartz crisis’ – the introduction of quartz watches in the 1970s and early 1980s that largely replaced mechanical watches – in the 1950s-60s the firm enjoyed a good reputation as the maker of good-quality, affordable automatic mechanical watches.

The George I period giltwood and gilt gesso girandole or mirror shown here belonged to art historian, connoisseur and collector Ralph Edwards (1894-1977).

Christie’s Jewels has appointed Eleanor Walper as associate vice president and specialist at Christie’s in Los Angeles.

One of the earliest items of football memorabilia to appear at auction emerged at Bonhams in Knightsbridge: an England international goalkeeper shirt from 1879.

A collection of Chinese snuff bottles offered in two sessions stands out among an intriguing selection of Asia Week New York auctions and dealer shows.

Two letters in the hand of Benjamin Franklin, dating from 1782 and 1784 and both relating to the terms of the peace agreement between the newly independent USA and Britain that were being worked out during negotiations in Paris, provided the highest bids at Bonhams New York (27.5/25/20/14.5% buyer’s premium) on December 15.

The record-shattering sum of $41m paid for an extremely rare, 1787 first printing of the US Constitution at Sotheby’s New York last November was covered in ATG No 2520, but a sale held by the same auction house a few days later, on November 23, also contained rare items of American historical interest.

This Irish bog oak canoe or trough was among the quirkier – and best-performing – lots in Bonhams’ (27.5/25/20/14.5% buyer’s premium) ‘without reserve’ sale of the Jim Lennon collection in Edinburgh on January 26.

One of the highlights of the April 2007 London Islamic sale series had been this 2ft 4in (74cm) high white marble bust of Maharajah Duleep Singh by neoclassical sculptor John Gibson.