Manuscript

A selection of 14 upcoming lots from auctions taking place around the UK and overseas.

Three upcoming UK book auctions

The book trade has called for institutions to be more proactive in reporting missing items after two notebooks belonging to Charles Darwin were mysteriously returned to Cambridge University Library.

A recently rediscovered miniature book by Charlotte Brontë (1816-55) is on offer at the New York International Antiquarian Book Fair (NYIABF) this month.

Sometimes it pays to look a little further afield.

Two very different lots from a Sussex sale are noted here: a German manuscript of Lenten sermons and the tale of a toy rabbit.

The collection of the late Americana book dealer William Reese (1955-2018) is coming to Christie’s from May this year.

One of around 30 known medieval English folding almanacs, and one of only a few in private hands, sold for £95,000 (plus 20% buyer’s premium) at Tennants.

The World Chess Championship currently taking place in Dubai began on November 26 in familiar style.

A great many of the lots that brought prices in the £1000-10,000 range in a recent Cheltenham sale were multiples of varying size – some running to as many as a hundred volumes – but noted here are a couple with that same Spetchley Park provenance that can be more precisely defined.

Part of a medieval manuscript stolen in Italy more than 30 years ago has been returned with the help of London firm Bloomsbury Auctions.

Armenian manuscript demolishes estimate to take six figures in London saleroom

A richly illuminated leaf from a late 15th century manuscript account of the life of St Catherine sold at a high-estimate £30,000 at Bloomsbury Auctions (25/20/12% buyer’s premium).

This 15th century copy of the Life of St Radegund is an illuminated biography of the canonised sixth-century Frankish queen Radegund.

Charles Carroll’s printed copy of the Declaration of Independence – discovered earlier this year in a Scottish family home – sold at auction in Philadelphia for $3.7m (£2.85m) plus premium.