Club

UK auctioneer hails successful sale offering attractive investments to buyers worldwide

A selection of Oceanic hardwood clubs and shields has come for sale at Sworders in Essex on November 9-10 as part of the auction of objects from the collection of dealer Jan Ellen Finch (1952-2021) of Finch & Co.

Overseas interest in tribal art and Doulton Lambeth wares fuelled the higher prices at Cuttlestones’ (20% buyer’s premium) Penkridge sale but it was a new outbreak of cardomania which raised temperatures of collectors across England.

Only a handful of companies have created products with sufficient impact that their brand names become generic descriptions for objects of their type.

Two lots from Tennants’ (20% buyer’s premium) sale in Leyburn on September 4. The 17th century Korean leather and steel helmet sold to a South Korean buyer for £4800.

This 4ft (1.2m) long Tongan Aku-Tau ironwood war club will feature in a sale of Militaria and Ethnographica to be held by Tennants in Leyburn, North Yorkshire, on September 4.

Having stood at Guernsey airport from 1946-81, the island post box shown below came out of storage in 1988 for presentation to the late politician and lawyer Roger Perrot who died earlier this year.

A tribal war club from the Marquesas Islands with textbook provenance has sold for £71,000 at Woolley & Wallis. The u’u (head club) came for sale at the Salisbury saleroom from the descendants of an early-19th century missionary.

The biannual world tour of tribal lands – Alaska to New Zealand via Arizona, Africa and Taiwan – organised by auctioneer Will Hobbs at Woolley & Wallis (25% buyer’s premium) offered a global view of what is an active, if often unpredictable, field.