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On Friday, June 28, Michael Bloomstein of Brighton was paying the following for bulk scrap against a gold fix of $1413.20 / €1243.08 / £1114.87

From the 18th century onwards, the city of Birmingham was a major centre of the British gun-making industry.

The parent company of Wright Marshall Fine Art Auctioneers is in administration and a search for a new owner is under way, writes Laura Chesters.

Christie’s marathon 12-hour auction of Indian jewellery and works of art from the Al Thani family held in New York included the finest collection of courtly weapons to come to auction in well over a generation.

Scantily catalogued as a Georgian/Victorian micro-mosaic plaque depicting a dove, a classic example of the pieces produced by Italian craftsmen and beloved by wealthy Britons on the Grand Tour was equally appreciated by bidders at Stroud Auctions (18% buyer’s premium).

Published in Venice in November 1494, a copy of Luca Pacioli’s 'Summa de arithmetica, geometria, proporzioni et proporzionalità…' offered in a recent US sale was granted the rare privilege in the book auction world of having a catalogue all of its own.

Diane Evans-Taylor is a vintage dealer and runs an upholstery business in the Cumbrian town of Ulverston.

MADAM – Having made a few appearances in ATG recently, a small silver pepper pot in the form of a Suffragette was eventually auctioned in London at an extraordinary hammer price of £3200 against an estimate of £800-900 [see picture below].

Morphy Auctions’ latest Fine & Decorative Arts sale held in Denver, Pennsylvania included this unusual 7½in (19cm) Russian silver-mounted pottery vase.

The month-long Open House Festival held throughout August in the seaside town of Bangor in Co Down, kicks off earlier this year on Saturday, July 6, with a big vintage event held by the festival organisers.

MADAM – The niello designs on the ‘Persian’ Esther scroll sold at Lyon & Turnbull (ATG No 2398) indicate that in my opinion this is likely to be Iraqi work rather than Persian.

The origin of ‘Tudor’ globe pomanders is still under discussion. It is generally thought that most originate from northern Europe but were probably made by itinerant craftsmen in a number of countries.

In the spring of 1940, Eric Ravilious (1903-42) spent three weeks in Grimsby during his role as a war artist.

A round-up of art and antiques news from the previous seven days, including the theft of a bronze statue stolen for the second time in two decades.

Beyond the Horizon was the title given to the remarkable Mopelia collection of atlases and travel books offered in a June 5 sale in London.

Our weekly selection from salerooms and dealerships.

Miners heading to work in the early morning with lit lamps, denizens of northern pubs with flat caps and pipes, women pushing prams or hanging up the washing: these figures populate the works of Norman Cornish (1919-2014), the ‘pitman painter’.

Percy Kelly (1918-93) was so averse to the limelight that only a few of his paintings were ever shown publicly during his life. But a major retrospective in 2015 and a birth centenary last year has helped raise the Cumbrian artist’s profile – and his prices.

Views of Venice figure prominently in a collection of 42 Old Master drawings from the 18th century, being sold by Metz in Heidelberg on July 20.

Numerous tribes inhabit the Cross River state of south-eastern Nigeria, close to the border with Cameroon. Animals of many kinds play a major part in the myths and religions of the area.