Scotland

Private domestic demand rather than trade drives bidding at Scottish and Irish art auctions.

Alongside two key early maps of colonial North America (see News, ATG No 2422) the sale at Ramsay Cornish (20% buyer’s premium) in Edinburgh on December 7 was distinguished by five-figure bids for two rare items.

Two key early maps of colonial North America were offered for sale at Ramsay Cornish in Edinburgh on December 7.

Two lots of Japanese cloisonné – both by top-drawer Meiji workshops – merited sums way over estimate at a sale conducted by Thomas R Callan (20% buyer’s premium) in Ayr on November 30.

A central Edinburgh location, men wearing tartan trousers and kilts and a bagpiper greeting guests: three ingredients suggesting that Lyon & Turnbull has hosted the most Scottish of parties to celebrate 20 years since its renaissance as an auction house.

An early watercolour by Isabel Codrington (1874-1943) depicts the Norse legend of the goddess Iduna and King Thiassi, who disguised himself as an eagle to kidnap her.

Instruction from author Fleming was thankfully not followed and first issue survives.

Some of the most striking 19th-20th century jewellery can often be found in design sales.

An early Wemyss Victoria pattern ink stand decorated with plumbs is offered by Carse Antiques for £395 at The Scone Palace Antiques & Fine Art Fair.

A Linthorpe pottery sake bottle designed for the Middlesbrough pottery by Dr Christopher Dresser has sold for a record £17,000 (plus 25% buyer’s premium).

A white-metal regimental badge estimated at £50-100 sold for £4800 at Lindsay Burns (20% buyer’s premium) in Perth, Scotland, on September 3. Why? It probably hailed from the time and place of the American War of Independence (1775-83).

Two early maps of colonial north America come for sale at Ramsay Cornish in Edinburgh on December 7. They were discovered at the Edinburgh home of the late Dr Ann Carswell, an American born in Washington and educated at Cornell and Harvard.

A reminder of football’s early days, when huge crowds watched teams from the Scottish league playing counterparts from England, this 15ct gold medal with enamelled Scottish lion rampant was a hit when offered in its spiritual home of Glasgow by McTear’s (24% buyer’s premium).

A generation ago pieces such as this splendid 20in (50cm) famille rose ‘dragon’ charger from the Guangxu period (1874-1908) were valued chiefly as decorative objects. However, appreciation of the best quality porcelain produced in the last years of the Qing continues to grow.

Just a little less famous than Fry’s 'Five Boys' image is the illustration by Tom Browne of a multi-class group outside a sweetshop with the line from 'Troilus and Cressida: One touch of Nature makes the whole World kin'.

A rare contrast to the Jacobite glass which has served Edinburgh auction house Lyon & Turnbull (25% buyer’s premium) so well was a large mid-18th century goblet with a wheel engraved portrait of the victor of Culloden. It was inscribed 'His Royal Highness William Duke Of Cumberland'.

Sometimes it’s easy to forget that the football league in Scotland has not always been dominated by Celtic and Rangers. The last time a team outside the Old Firm won the title was Aberdeen in 1985.

Celtic legend Tommy Gemmell’s boots from the 1967 European Cup final went under the hammer at Glasgow auction house McTear’s (24% buyer’s premium) on July 19. They doubled the lower estimate, selling at £14,000.

The National Museums of Scotland has been revealed as the buyer of the Storrar Coverlet – a rare woollen textile withdrawn at the 11th hour from a sale at Lyon & Turnbull in Edinburgh in August.