Latest News Articles by Ian McKay
Early movers in the chess playing world
08 April 2019Born in Celico, southern Italy and consequently known as ‘The Calabrian’, Gioachino Greco is considered the first professional chess player.
Impressive body of work on sale
01 April 2019Medical and scientific library includes landmark Vesalius study on human anatomy.
The progress of man in Somerset
01 April 2019A ‘turn-up’ religious text was one of the earlier, rarer and more expensive items in a Somerset sale.
Players, poets, printers and pedallers
25 March 2019A table game published by John Wallis called The Mirror of Truth was one of two notable juvenilia lots in the opening children’s and illustrated books section of a March 6 Devon sale.
A pharmacist’s passion for print
25 March 2019The first of four sales scheduled by Morphets of Harrogate for the dispersal of a single private library will take place on April 3-4.
Two sales in Gloucestershire and west London feature sizeable ornithological sections
18 March 2019Ornithological books and artworks have played their part in the success of two recent sales and a selection of just a few of those lots begins with books from the Ladwell library.
Beano, Eagle, Sweethearts and Scoops in demand at Comic Book Auctions timed sale
18 March 2019Though it sold just a touch under the lower estimate, a copy of the 1938 launch issue of Beano was the top lot in a Comic Book Auctions (19% buyer’s premium) timed auction of March 3 held on thesaleroom.com.
Medley of tastes on offer in California
18 March 2019A Californian sale of March 7 certainly offered great variety in age, content and price range. Promoted as A Biblio-Medley for All Tastes, it ran to well over 500 lots across its printed and supplementary, online catalogues – with at least one lot, a volume of the works of Arthur Hallam, sold for just $10.
British and Irish book auctions: March 19-30, 2019
18 March 2019ATG’s calendar of book auctions taking place in the UK and Ireland from March 19-30, 2019.
Devon auction to offer library of renowned botanist
17 March 2019Running to just 60 or so pages, a little promotional work called ‘Autotypography: Or Art of Nature-Printing...’ coming up for sale in Devon on March 26 proves to have a rather complex tale to tell.
Questions of body and soul in West Sussex sale
11 March 2019Seventeenth century philosophical work sold in Sussex discusses nature of life and death.
Mein Kampf hits headlines and Indian works make an impact at auction
11 March 2019The lot that gained all the publicity in a recent Shropshire sale, even national newspaper coverage, was a copy of Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf.
Price is far from the end of the world for Durer Apocalypse
11 March 2019Conducted by Christie’s Paris (25/20/12.5% buyer’s premium) in collaboration with Bertrand Meaudre of Paris dealer Librairie Landarchet, a February 20 sale featured the dispersal of the library of Marc Litzler for a premium-inclusive total of €4.4m (£3.82m).
House up at auction reveals shock mouse
11 March 2019The concertina-cut novelty pictured here is one in which a painted roundel of a cottage pulls up to reveal a large mouse.
British and Irish book auctions: March 12-23, 2019
11 March 2019ATG’s calendar of book auctions taking place in the UK and Ireland from March 12-23, 2019.
CS Lewis and Keynes among Oxford highlights
04 March 2019A very rare and inscribed example of CS Lewis’ first published work, a 1919 collection of verses previewed ATG No 2377, was sold recently in Oxford for £2800. Spirits in Bondage was part of the extensive book section of a January 30-31 sale at Mallams (23% buyer’s premium).
British and Irish book auctions: March 5-16, 2019
04 March 2019ATG’s calendar of book auctions taking place in the UK and Ireland from March 5-16, 2019.
Works once part of a Scottish house library form a key part of Edinburgh auction
04 March 2019A small group of lots in a recent Edinburgh sale were once part of the library of the late 5th Earl of Lovelace at Torridon House.
King William returns… and the wonders of the world
04 March 2019Two unusual and successful lots from a February 20 sale held by Lockdales (19.5% buyer’s premium) of Ipswich.
Garden grapple over Brown
04 March 2019A Dissertation on Oriental Gardening… is the single volume that I have selected from a recent Gloucestershire auction in which job lots were very much in evidence and that acted as a sort of extra, clearing-the-decks sort of exercise in the saleroom’s calendar.