Auctions

This Qianlong mark and period hat or wig stand sold for a massive £360,000 at a recent Cheffins sale in Cambridge.

Spink have set a new record for any English silver coin at £330,000, paid for the finest known example of the Reddite, an extremely rare Crown of Charles II dating to 1663.

A rare painting of two big cats by George Stubbs will be offered for sale at Sotheby’s Old Master sale in London on July 9.

New York has hosted three key events in the modern commercial history of the Martin Brothers.

Eighty lots from a local estate ensured a flying start to Mallams’ recent sale in Oxford and provided an insight into the taste and interests of a collector buying 60 years ago.

A group of private collectors from China’s Hunan province have privately purchased the famed Min Fanglei, a bronze ritual wine vessel from the Late Shang or Early Western Zhou period due to be sold in New York last month.

A unique silver penny dug up in a field near Nottingham last November has revealed the existence of a previously unknown mint during the reign of King Stephen (1135-54).

The rare First World War German ship’s bell featured in ATG No 2133 has found a very suitable home – the National Museum of the Royal Navy (NMRN) at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard.

Estimated at £8000-12,000, this rare pair of Meissen figures of red squirrels, c.1750, modelled by J.J.Kändler, took £45,000 at Bellmans auctions of Wisborough Green, near Billingshurst.

The stand-alone evening sale of 15 paintings by L.S. Lowry at Sotheby’s on March 26 raised £13m, with all bar two works getting away.

Images and footage of the First World War seem to be featuring prominently on TV at the moment, no doubt part of the extra attention engendered by the marking of the centenary of the outbreak of the conflict in 1914.

South London auctioneers Rosebery’s sold the Masonic collection of Albert Edward Collins Nice (1898-1969) as the first tranche of their quarterly fine art sale that covered three days and three catalogues.

Sotheby’s have had to buy back the 59.60 carat flawless fancy vivid pink diamond they sold in Geneva last November for a world record $83m.

A packed saleroom and a continuous barrage of phone bids combined to ensure a near sell-out, multi-estimate result at Sotheby’s in Paris for their three-session auction (in association with Artcurial) of the collection of Félix Marcilhac.

The British Postal Museum & Archive (BPMA) has revised its policy for sales of duplicates following controversy surrounding last July’s Sotheby’s auction.

Theophilus Jones, a private in the Durham Light Infantry, achieved the unfortunate distinction of being the first soldier to be killed on British soil during the First World War.

This Charles II eight-day longcase clock by Joseph Knibb – a ‘snapshot’ of early longcase clock development – doubled its estimate to sell for £240,000 at Dreweatts & Bloomsbury Auctions sale in Donnington Priory.

A sketch by LS Lowry will be offered at Peter Wilson of Nantwich in Cheshire on May 1.

A rare early work by the Dutch Old Master painter Dirck Van Delen (c.1605-1671) will be offered at Halls of Shrewsbury on April 16.

This 13in (33cm) Macintyre & Co Florian ware vase dated to 1898 and designed by William Moorcroft is going under the hammer at Catherine Southon’s sale in Surrey.