Essex

Bibles from the Mulberry House sold well at Sworders in Stansted Mountfitchet

Nine-strong collection of Georgian and Victorian games counts as a highlight of mixed auction

It is perhaps fitting that the shirt belonging to a player who scored two goals successively in the quarter, semi final and final of the 1975 FA Cup would double its top estimate at Stacey’s (25% buyer’s premium) on April 28.

Sworders’ run of single-owner sales continues with a two-day auction on May 13-14 titled Paul Atkinson, The Nomadic Collector.

Ken Besford of Durham Promotions NE, organiser of the Great North Decorative Antique Fair, is heading down the straight for the spring edition (Saturday and Sunday, April 26-27) of the triannual event he launched last year at Newcastle Racecourse.

Metal-detecting finds, properly reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme and since disclaimed as Treasure, are increasing significantly the supply of pre-Georgian jewels. Some fine examples have appeared at auction of late.

An atypical entry to the March 4-9 sale at the Harwich antiquities specialist TimeLine is this gold medal struck in Philadelphia following the sinking of American steamship Casper, on December 23, 1928.

Chanel No 5 was perfected in the late summer and autumn of 1920 by the French-Russian chemist and perfumer Ernest Beaux.

A Roman marble portrait bust of an Antonine prince emerged Sworders’ (25% buyer’s premium) sale in Stansted Mountfitchet.

The auction market can be a fickle beast, as results for the same items offered on separate occasions sometimes show.

A pair of neoclassical mahogany and ormolu demilune pier tables, believed to be John Hobbs-Buggins fakes, have sold for a tiny fraction of their original retail price.

This 20in (51cm) pottery figure of a rhinoceros is dated to the Tang (618-907AD) period.

The late 1960s was a glorious time to be a Baggies fan.