Forum Auctions

While the rare book trade is steadily becoming more diverse, challenges still exist, as four newer members of the Forum Auctions team in London tell ATG

Estimated at £300-500, a group of five hand-coloured prints of early 19th century Canada sold for £8500 at Gorringe’s (25% buyer’s premium) in Lewes.

Refugees in Chelsea was written by Henry James (1843-1916) to help the local Chelsea Committee to raise funds in the US to start an industry for crippled Belgian soldiers.

Annotation of 1803-04 work included in a single collection features remark about his mistress

A lively market has emerged for the linocuts of Great Bardfield artist Edward Bawden

Despite volatility in so many markets, the rare book world continues to offer a calm respite, as Rupert Powell of Forum Auctions writes

Boole’s 1847 paper would ‘find widespread use in the design of computers and communication systems’

This copy of 'The Study of Sociology' by Herbert Spencer is a first edition from 1875 in original cloth.

Manuscript including recipes sold for £15,000 was written by a lady who died ‘aged around 100’

Sixteenth century work edited by Hakluyt aimed to encourage English expansion and influence

A 15th century first edition of a pioneering work by Johannes Gallensis surfaced at auction late last month.

Highlights from London auction also include art historian’s collection and extraordinary Orwell oddity

'Plumb-pudding in danger or State Epicures taking un Petit Souper' is the most famous of all James Gillray’s satirical caricatures and perhaps the most well-known of all Georgian political cartoons.

Dreweatts and Forum Auctions are to hold their first joint sale this month.

First part of a collection which covered the walls and cellar of two whole flats is offered at auction

First and only published volume of South American work appears in London saleroom

A couple of ballet-related lots danced away for high prices over the summer.

Boasting 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.

Bid 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…

Catalogued as a ‘very good, complete copy in original condition of the first really modern scientific book published in England’, a 1600 first edition (Peter Short) of De Magnete by William Gilbert is estimated at £10,000-15,000 in Forum Auction’s Fine Books, Manuscripts & Works on Paper sale in London on September 29.