Print Edition

Organiser of events across the country has fingers crossed for fairs scheduled later in 2020.

MADAM – I note with interest that the Firsts London rare book fair is on the move again (News, ATG No 2454).

The centuries-old Indonesian habit of chewing betel nut, the fruit of the reach palm, was quickly adopted by settlers from the Dutch East India Company who appreciated both its psychoactive properties and its importance as a local social ritual.

PBFA (Provincial Booksellers Fairs Association) has held four monthly online book fairs, with the fifth going live to the public at noon on Saturday, August 29. Up to 15 books/items can be put up for sale by each bookseller member.

The so-called Elcho bayonet was designed for the Martini-Henry rifle in 1870 by Lord Elcho, the 10th Earl of Wemyss & March.

Edition of Macbeth that once belonged to actor Charlton Heston.

Thousands of items are available to buy from dealers online. Here we pick out one that caught our eye this week.

Suzanne Hall is the organiser of a small monthly midweek antiques and fleamarket in Old Windsor which is reopening as lockdown eases on Wednesday, September 2, at the Memorial Hall.

While Sotheby’s and Christie’s shifted their main Old Master offerings to the end of July, Bonhams (27.5/25/20/13.9% buyer’s premium) maintained its auction earlier in the month with a sale in New Bond Street on July 7-8.

Our weekly selection from salerooms.

A collection of Japanese arms and armour is a key feature of Cowan’s arms and armour auction to be held in Cincinnati on September 2.

MADAM – Many of your readers will already have heard the news that the National Trust is going through a consultation process and will make up to 1200 redundancies as it expects to lose up to £200m this year.

The Robert Thompson firm produced shire horses, such as this example offered by Lawrences (25% buyer’s premium) of Crewkerne on July 23, from the 1960s-90s.

Edward Haughey, Baron Ballyedmond (1944-2014) – the founder of the Norbrook pharmaceutical group in Northern Ireland – proved just as influential in the world of politics as he was in business.

Almost 2.5 million of these Second World War British posters with the now famous slogan were printed in 12 different sizes.

Online buying: realised prices at auctions on thesaleroom.com

The two ink drawings reproduced here both made substantial sums in a June 27 sale of comic strip artwork held in Paris by Artcurial.

Included in the Asian art section of the Kendzia two-day sale in Hamburg on September 4-5 is this set of nine Kangxi blue and white plates painted with a design of a lotus pond with flowers and insects.

The best-known press-moulded models made by John Derbyshire at the Regent Road Flint Glassworks in Salford are the series of animal and figural paperweights made in frosted, flint and coloured glass.

Our regular listing of British and Irish book auctions.