Latest News Articles by Ian McKay
Britannia rules in Surrey saleroom
31 October 2022The big attraction in a job lot estimated at £60-100 that went on to sell for £14,000 in a September 23 sale held by Ewbank’s (25% buyer’s premium) was a copy of Britannia: or, a Chorographical Description…, Dr Edmund Gibson’s 1695, updated and English language version of a well-known earlier work.
British and Irish book auctions: November 1-12, 2022
31 October 2022Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions.
Virgil, the Scottish version
24 October 2022Translation was first time a major poem of antiquity appeared in an English language form.
Victoria’s journal of Highlands life affordable for the little people
24 October 2022An edition of Queen Victoria’s Leaves from the Journal of our Life on the Highlands… took £550 at a Mallams (25% buyer’s premium) sale of September 23.
The way to locate buffaloes and locals with second sight
24 October 2022Bid to £3400, a 1703 first edition of Martin Martin’s Description of the Western Islands of Scotland in a later full calf binding proved the most expensive item in the 250-lot book and ephemera section that opened an October 5-7 auction at Stride & Son (18% buyer’s premium).
Rare glimpse of Inca culture
17 October 2022First and only published volume of South American work appears in London saleroom
Torn jacket but a tidy sum
17 October 2022Though the dust jacket featuring one of Pauline Baynes’ illustrations for the book is torn with loss and exhibits a number of patched repairs, a 1950 first edition of 'The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe' did sell for £1100 against a guide of £500-700 on October 6 at Buckinghamshire saleroom Bourne End Auctions (17.5% buyer’s premium).
British and Irish book auctions: October 18-30, 2022
17 October 2022Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions
Fine crop of agricultural works from the Glaisdale library
10 October 2022Collection gathered in by a local farmer comes to auction in North Yorkshire
Moxon Junior shaped up to be a talented son of Joseph
10 October 2022Illustrated here is a complete deck of James Moxon’s ‘Geometrical’ cards, each bearing figures of scientific instruments and dating from the mid-1690s.
Happy news for salerooms: not the end of Spider-Man
10 October 2022Four auction records were set in the first 90 minutes of a recent four-day comics and comic art auction conducted by Heritage (20% buyer’s premium).
British and Irish book auctions: October 11-27, 2022
10 October 2022Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions.
Calcutta seen in colonial days
03 October 2022Early views of the city now known as Kolkata reveal 19th development under empire
‘Anatomical first’ makes appearance
03 October 2022Boasting what have been described as the first accurate anatomical illustrations of the foetus in utero among its 39 engraved plates, a 1761, second edition of William Smellie’s 'Sett of Anatomical Tables… of the Practice of Midwifery' was one of the highlights of an online-only Forum (25/20/12.5% buyers premium) sale of September 15.
Puritan work starts to bear fruit in New England
03 October 2022Very much the star turn in a Philadelphia sale of September 21 was an extremely rare copy of 'New Englands First Fruits…', a small quarto work, running to just 26pp, that was printed and published in London in 1643.
British and Irish book auctions: October 4-14, 2022
03 October 2022Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions.
WG Grace bowls over bidders
26 September 2022Two albums of photographs taken by fellow cricketer and friend pitch in at four-figure sum.
Reese: mad about Melville
26 September 2022The latest in a series of auctions to draw on the private library of one of the more prominent antiquarian book dealers of his generation, William S Reese (1955-2018), ran from September 1-14 at Christie’s New York (26/20/14.5% buyer’s premium).
British and Irish book auctions, September 27-October 11, 2022
26 September 2022Our regular listing of UK and Irish book auctions.
Make a wicked £9500 bonus
19 September 2022Bid to £9500 rather than the suggested £150-200 was a copy of the first, and possibly only edition ever seen at auction of William Knight’s A Concordance Axiomaticall…