Auctioneers

Hot on the heels of Christie’s offering a collection of more than 80 18th century Battersea and Bilston enamels formed by interwar connoisseur Nellie Ionides (part of the May 27 auction of items from the estate of Lord and Lady Swaythling), Tennants (20% buyer’s premium) featured a smaller selection of similar wares across two sales in the summer.

Anti-slavery objects are enjoying a particular strong moment in the market as museums at home and in the US seek to fill holes in collections vulnerable to the label ‘pale, male and stale’.

A raft of contents sales from grand English estates is coming up this autumn.

The sale of Scottish Works of Art & Whisky at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh on August 17 included this remarkable mid-18th century Jacobite goblet.

A previously unknown sketchbook of watercolours and drawings relating to the California Gold Rush took £16,000 (plus 25% buyer’s premium) at Chiswick Auctions.

The highlight of the latest maritime sale at Adam Partridge in Liverpool was a collection of 40 menus for dinners held between 1899-1919 in honour of various British and foreign dignitaries.

The Woolley & Wallis sale in Salisbury on September 21 titled Arts of Africa, Oceania and he Americas includes a small section of antiquities.

A collection of portraits from a descendant of the Hicks Beach family of Witcombe Park will be offered at Chorley’s on September 21-22.

Famille rose vases decorated with ‘Hundred Boys’ scenes are among the most commercial of all Qing ceramics.

The owl had been a symbol of wealth and wisdom since the days of ancient Greece and inspired designers such as Lalique.

Special Auctions Services (25% buyer’s premium) in Newbury sold the collection of John Garside last month.

The appetite for early Manchester United memorabilia is strong – even for a player who started out at their arch-rivals

A portrait of a young man once thought to be a self-portrait by the Milanese artist Andrea Solario (1460-1524) attracted keen enquiries ahead of sale.

Among a number of Old Master portraits on offer in Cambridge is a depiction of a gentleman that has been consigned from a private collection in Suffolk.

The latest sale of Clocks, Watches, & Scientific Instruments held by Bonhams Skinner (25% buyer’s premium) included one of perhaps only 50 surviving Tornek-Rayville TR-900 stainless steel dive watches.

Sotheby’s (25/20/13.9% buyer’s premium plus 1% overhead premium) latest Old Master evening sale in London was the smallest in terms of the number of lots that anyone could remember at one of these flagship summer events.

The headline borrows the title given to an online Christie’s (26/20% buyer’s premium) sale – one that presented more than 80 modern first editions.

Although, thanks in part to Bram Stoker’s Dracula (first published in 1897), bats have acquired a reputation as ‘creatures of the night’ in many cultures they are viewed as symbols of luck or reincarnation.