Armour

The Munich auction house Hermann Historica (25% buyer’s premium) is renowned for its huge multi-catalogue sales series, but on September 25 it mounted a special, selected sale of works of art held at Schloss Greding, south of Nuremburg.

Two eye-catching but very different armours, one suited to royal palace style and the other more to purist taste, captured bidders’ attention at a London sale.

Armour made a strong showing at the sale held in Sarzana by Italian arms specialist Czerny (20% buyer’s premium) on September 19.

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.

A 16th century composite suit of armour that had been assembled by a specialist curator in this field at the Metropolitan Museum of Art proved to be the toast of a sale held by Morphy.

Rare and well-preserved armour from pre-history to the 17th century was well received in the pre-Christmas sales. Three examples are pictured here.

A rifle from the personal armoury of Tipu Sultan sold for £60,000 in Oxfordshire last week.

It has not been a vintage season for armour in the saleroom, but some of the recent highlights from London and Munich are shown here.

A famous royal regiment was remembered at the Peter Francis (20% buyer’s premium) auction in Carmarthen.

Thomas Del Mar (24% buyer’s premium) sold the first instalment of de-accessioned arms and armour from the John Woodman Higgins Museum in Massachusetts back in 2013 and a second in 2014.

For many years auctioneers have been itching to move the finest arms and armour from the province of the specialist collector and establish them with a wider audience as works of art in their own right.

A superb set of decorated armour sold at Sotheby’s (25/20/12% buyer’s premium) is believed to have set a record. The £880,000 hammer price for the three-quarter-length cuirassier protection is believed to be the highest auction result for 17th century armour.