North America

A small collection of Hester Bateman silver appeared Stateside at Lewis & Grant (25% buyer’s premium) in Newport, Kentucky.

Sculptor Naum Kongiser (1904-84) created the propaganda figure Radio for the Village for the State Porcelain Manufactory in 1927.

The semi-precious stones adorning the hilts and scabbards of many of the best Ottoman swords held talismanic significance.

A Gorham Martelé covered silver tankard hammered for $7500 (£5875) at Grogan & Company (25% buyer’s premium) in Boston at its September 26 Silver and Decorative Arts sale. It was estimated at $2000-3000.

A familiar and important piece of Scottish silver appeared at Waddington’s (25/22% buyer’s premium) auction in Toronto on November 7.

The two leading US trade associations have won a legal challenge against a law that said dealers in New York could not display antiques made from more than 20% elephant ivory.

When it was last sold 30 years ago, Chinese export figures of this rare type were thought to depict a Dutch lady - perhaps the wife of a governor of Batavia.

Maryland auction offers a fascinating collection of Chinese porcelain intended for foreign markets

A single-owner collection of Antiquities & Oddities offered without reserve by Shapiro Auctions 30/29/18.9% buyer’s premium) in Mamaroneck, New York included several fine South American objects made in the Spanish colonial era.

The French-American sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle (1930-2002) started making jewellery in the early 1970s after she was introduced to the Italian goldsmith Giancarlo Montebello in Paris.

Les Enluminures has sold a thousand-year-old Giant Bible of St Maximin to the National Library of Luxembourg for €4.5m (£3.735m)

One of the very first commercial box telephones appeared for sale at White’s Auctions (27% buyer’s premium) in Middleboro, Massachusetts.

Getty collection provides another auction highlight while glass and patinated bronze lanterns also shine in Massachusetts

In Norman Dean’s day, to be a watch collector was to collect pocket watches. In today’s market, when the 20th century mechanical wristwatch is king, demand for pocket watches is now markedly segmented.

George II period furniture bought by ‘international bidder’ for five-times top estimate in Connecticut