Rare Book Monthly

Articles - January - 2020 Issue

The Pie is getting Larger

It’s difficult to be older in a world that is less certain but there is some good news!

 

No, you aren’t getting younger but there is evidence of an increase in the number of auction buyers in the books, manuscripts, maps and ephemera categories and it’s a helpful sign.

 

People whose lives revolve around old and rare books face complex issues as they age because their children rarely want to join the field or inherit the debris.  That leaves the dealer or collector to sell as best they can.  Such material falls into two categories,  the commonly available that should go to listing sites to be discounted, and the unusual and important that can be sold by dealers or go to auction where such transactions become part of our statistics.    Most sellers will be optimistic and assume their material is highly collectible but auction houses and the market have seen this movie before and will generally not be convinced.  Such material then shifts toward the progressive discounting model on the listing sites until buyers are found, an adjustment that takes time because seller hope dies slowly. 

 

The seeds of today’s pessimism were planted years ago, when the market was thought to be monolithic.  Then we discovered it was not.  Some categories would be strong and others weak and the term employed to explain this - cyclical – a phrase that optimistically, and I think without any blanket justification, carries the seeds of recovery in it.  Today the new division is between the common and collectible and in ten years we’ll have gathered additional perspectives.

 

Pessimism is nothing new.  Dealers have been anxious for decades over the apparent absence of new collectors.  But there have been encouraging signs.  Auction houses have been entering the field and once in, built collectible paper into their calendars.  For them these are business decisions born of evidence they regularly see.  What’s been less certain has been whether that evidence is of sellers looking to sell, buyers looking to buy, or a combination of both.  The selling has been understandable, the buying a changing combination of dealers, institutions and collectors that to successfully absorb the rising tide of material coming out, was always going to require a significant increase in collectors.  And we are seeing this today. 

 

What’s been changing about  the market are three negative and one positive factors;  [1] on the downside ever increasing online inventory, [2] the aging of its principal owners, and [3] their increasing difficulty finding buyers even with price cuts.  On the bright side, there is a transition, now underway, as many collectors re-focus their collecting based less on dealer inventories and more on deeper searches and theoretical availability because such approaches are yielding surprisingly good results.  And in doing this, it strengthens collectors’ commitments by creating and meeting expectations.  This is the “hey, this works” model and it works well.

 

This narrower, more focused approach seems to be part of the reason the market has stabilized.  It’s simply more satisfying and seems to be sufficiently appealing to compete with other collecting forms.  So, you look and then look again and bit by bit you find the unexpected, often unappreciated, frequently at very reasonable prices.  

 

This is the new collecting.

 

Recently I saw a patch of blue sky for the future of such collections:  clear evidence of increasing numbers of buyers in the auction statistics we’ve been developing over the past 17 years.

 

As part of the Rare Book Hub / Americana Exchange database project we record auction statistics and the numbers are many, almost a blur.  But consider this.  The number of lots offered, percentage of lots sold  and the median sale price over the past 5 years, have all increased, suggesting the collectible paper market, at the auction level at least, is growing.  In real terms, in 2015, 423,000 lots were offered and this year a projected 510,000 when all the lots are counted, an increase of 18,000 lots annually [3.92%] that has also seen a rising percentage of lots selling, increasing from 73% to almost 77% over the same period.  That can’t happen without more participation and according to our sign-ups, it’s collectors that are making the difference.

 

 

 Year  Lots                    % Lots Sold                              Median Price

2019   512,463                          76+*                                        $275 projected**

2018   479,122                          75                                            $283

2017   418,028                          75                                            $267

2016   406,738                          73                                            $270

2015   422,909                          73                                            $266

* estimated when the last sales are archived

** projected when the last results are posted

 

So what does this mean?

 

At the auction level the market is growing and the purchases increasingly concentrated in the rare, unique and unusual and we believe it is collectors who are making the difference.    As they continue to learn they can carve out unique slices of the millions of items available they increasingly understand that collecting has become a search based business, something akin to an electronic game for codgers, that randomly turns up related material across the globe on various platforms and, when  they are open to it, notifies them.  And it’s a big deal.

 

 

 

Rare Book Monthly

  • Freeman’s | HindmanWestern Manuscripts and MiniaturesJuly 8, 2025 Freeman’s | HindmanWestern Manuscripts and MiniaturesJuly 8, 2025
    Freeman’s | Hindman
    Western Manuscripts and Miniatures
    July 8, 2025
    Freeman’s | Hindman
    Western Manuscripts and Miniatures
    July 8, 2025
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FRANCESCO PETRARCH (b. Arezzo, 20 July 1304; d. Arqua Petrarca, 19 July 1374). $20,000-30,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF THE VITAE IMPERATORUM (active Milan, 1431-1459). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF ATTAVANTE DEGLI ATTAVANTI (GABRIELLO DI VANTE) (active Florence, c. 1452-c. 1520/25). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. FOLLOWER OF HERMAN SCHEERE (active London, c. 1405-1425). $15,000-20,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. An exceptionally rare, illuminated music leaf from a Mozarabic Antiphonal with sister leaves mostly in museum collections. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Exceptional leaf from a prestigious Antiphonary by a leading illuminator of the late Duecento. $11,500-14,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. CIRCLE OF THE MASTER OF MS REID 33 and SELWERD ABBEY SCRIPTORIUM (AGNES MARTINI?) (active The Netherlands, Groningen, c. 1468-1510). $10,000-15,000.
    Freeman’s | Hindman, July 8. Previously unknown illumination from one of the most renowned Gothic Choir Book sets of the Middle Ages. $6,000-8,000.
  • Forum AuctionsFine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper  17th July 2025 Forum AuctionsFine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper  17th July 2025
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Lucianus Samosatensis. Dialogoi, editio princeps, second issue, Florence, Laurentius Francisci de Alopa, 1496. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Boccaccio (Giovanni). Il Decamerone, Florence, Philippo di Giunta, 1516. £10,000 to £15,000.
    Forum, July 17: Henry VII (King) & Philip the Fair (Duke of Burgundy). [Intercursus Magnus], [Commercial and Political Treaty between Henry VII and Philip Duke of Burgundy], manuscript copy in Latin, original vellum, 1499. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bible, English. The Holy Bible, Conteyning the Old Testament, and the New, Robert Barker, 1613. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Bond (Michael). A Bear Called Paddington, first edition, signed presentation inscription from the author, 1958. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum Auctions
    Fine Books, Manuscripts and Works on Paper
    17th July 2025
    Forum, July 17: Yeats (William Butler). The Secret Rose, first edition, with extensive autograph corrections, additions and amendments by the author for a new edition, 1897. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Byron (George Gordon Noel, Lord). Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, bound in dark green morocco elaborately tooled in gilt and with 3 watercolours to fore-edge, by Fazakerley of Liverpool, 1841. £4,000 to £6,000.
    Forum, July 17: Miró (Juan), Wassily Kandinsky, John Buckland-Wright, Stanley William Hayter and others.- Spender (Stephen). Fraternity, one of 101 copies, with signed engravings by 9 artists. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Sowerby (George Brettingham). Album comprising 22 leaves of original watercolour drawings of fossil remains of Cheltenham and Vicinity, [c.1840]. £6,000 to £8,000.
    Forum, July 17: Mathematics.- Blue paper copy.- Euclid. De gli Elementi, Urbino, Appresso Domenico Frisolino, 1575. £12,000 to £18,000.
  • Sotheby’sBooks, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to ModernNow through July 10, 2025 Sotheby’sBooks, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to ModernNow through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Book of Hours by the Masters of Otto van Moerdrecht, Use of Sarum, in Latin, Southern Netherlands (Bruges), c.1450. £20,000 to £30,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Albert Einstein. Autograph letter signed, to Attilio Palatino, on his research into General Relativity, 12 May 1929. £12,000 to £18,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: John Gould. The Birds of Europe, [1832-] 1837, 5 volumes, contemporary half morocco, subscriber’s copy. £40,000 to £60,000.
    Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts and Music from Medieval to Modern
    Now through July 10, 2025
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: Ian Fleming. A collection of James Bond first editions, 8 volumes in all. £8,000 to £12,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.K. Rowling. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, 1997, first edition, hardback issue. £50,000 to £70,000.
    Sotheby’s, Ending July 10: J.R.R. Tolkien. Autograph letter signed, to Amy Ronald, on Pauline Baynes's map of Middle Earth, 1970. £7,000 to £10,000.
  • Rare Book Hub is now mobile-friendly! Rare Book Hub is now mobile-friendly!
    Rare Book Hub is now mobile-friendly!
    Rare Book Hub is now mobile-friendly!
  • DOYLERare Books, Autographs & MapsJuly 23, 2025 DOYLERare Books, Autographs & MapsJuly 23, 2025
    DOYLE
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    July 23, 2025
    DOYLE
    Rare Books, Autographs & Maps
    July 23, 2025
    DOYLE, July 23: WALL, BERNHARDT. Greenwich Village. Types, Tenements & Temples. Estimate $300-500
    DOYLE, July 23: STOKES, I. N. PHELPS. The Iconography of Manhattan Island, 1498-1909. New York: Robert H. Dodd, 1915-28. Estimate: $3,000-5,000
    DOYLE, July 23: [AUTOGRAPH - US PRESIDENT]FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT. A signed photograph of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Estimate $500-800
    DOYLE, July 23: [ARION PRESS]. ABBOTT, EDWIN A. Flatland. A Romance of Many Dimensions. San Francisco, 1980. Estimate $2,000-3,000.
    DOYLE, July 23: TOLSTOY, LYOF N. and NATHAN HASKELL DOLE, translator. Anna Karénina ... in eight parts. New York: Thomas Y. Crowell & Co., [1886]. Estimate: $400-600
    DOYLE, July 23: ROWLING, J.K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. London: Bloomsbury, 2000. Estimate $1,200-1,800

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