-
Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 37: Archive of the pioneering woman artist Arrah Lee Gaul, most 1911-59. $3,000 to $4,000.Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 66: Letter describing the dropping water level at Owens Lake near Death Valley, long before it was drained, Keeler, CA, 26 July 1904. $3,000 to $4,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 102: To Horse, To Horse! My All for a Horse! The Washington Cavalry, illustrated Civil War broadside, Philadelphia, 1862. $4,000 to $6,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 135: Album of cyanotype views of the Florida panhandle and beyond, 224 photographs, 174 of them cyanotypes, Apalachicola, FL and elsewhere, circa 1895-1896. $1,200 to $1,800Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 154: Catalogue of the Library of the United States, as acquired from Thomas Jefferson, Washington, 1815. $15,000 to $25,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 173: New Englands First Fruits, featuring the first description of Harvard in print, London, 1643. $40,000 to $60,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 177: John P. Greene, Original manuscript diary of a mission to western New York with Joseph Smith, 1833. $60,000 to $90,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 243: P.E. Larson, photographer, Such is Life in the Far West: Early Morning Call in a Gambling Hall, Goldfield, NV, circa 1906. $2,500 to $3,500Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 261: Fred W. Sladen, Diaries of a WWII colonel commanding troops from Morocco to Italy to France, 1942-44. $3,000 to $4,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 309: Los mexicanos pintados por si mismos, por varios autores, a Mexican plate book. Mexico, 1854-1855. $2,000 to $3,000Swann, Nov. 21: Lot 8: Diaries of a prospector / trapper in the remote Alaska wilderness, 5 manuscript volumes. Alaska, 1917-64. $1,500 to $2,500. -
![<b>Finarte, Nov 20-21:</b> Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia, [col commento di Jacopo della Lana e Martino Paolo Nidobeato, curata da Martino Paolo Nidobeato e Guido da Terzago. Aggiunto Il Credo], 1478](https://ae-files.s3.amazonaws.com/AdvertisementPhotos/45a90570-7486-4199-91da-bd2e9a044380.jpg "<b>Finarte, Nov 20-21:</b> Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia, [col commento di Jacopo della Lana e Martino Paolo Nidobeato, curata da Martino Paolo Nidobeato e Guido da Terzago. Aggiunto Il Credo], 1478")
![<b>Finarte, Nov 20-21:</b> Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia [Commento di Christophorus Landinus, edita da Piero da Figino. Aggiunte le Rime diverse; Marsilius Ficinius, Ad Dantem gratulatio], 1491](https://ae-files.s3.amazonaws.com/AdvertisementPhotos/99566626-91f5-42da-8f8c-05fae35b4c67.jpg "<b>Finarte, Nov 20-21:</b> Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia [Commento di Christophorus Landinus, edita da Piero da Figino. Aggiunte le Rime diverse; Marsilius Ficinius, Ad Dantem gratulatio], 1491")
Finarte, Nov 20-21: Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia, [col commento di Jacopo della Lana e Martino Paolo Nidobeato, curata da Martino Paolo Nidobeato e Guido da Terzago. Aggiunto Il Credo], 1478Finarte, Nov 20-21: Alighieri, Dante - La Commedia [Commento di Christophorus Landinus, edita da Piero da Figino. Aggiunte le Rime diverse; Marsilius Ficinius, Ad Dantem gratulatio], 1491Finarte, Nov 20-21: Lactantius, Lucius Coelius Firmianus - Opera, 1465Finarte, Nov 20-21: Alighieri, Dante - Le terze rime di Dante, 1502Finarte, Nov 20-21: Boccaccio, Giovanni - Il Decamerone. Di messer Giouanni Boccaccio, 1516Finarte, Nov 20-21: Giordano Bruno - Candelaio comedia del Bruno nolano achademico di nulla achademia; detto il fastidito. In tristitia hilaris: in hilaritate tristis, 1582Finarte, Nov 20-21: Petrarca, Francesco - Le cose volgari di Messer Francesco Petrarcha, 1504Finarte, Nov 20-21: Legatura - Manoscritto - Medici - Cosimo III de' Medici / Solari, Giuseppe - I Ritratti Medicei overo Glorie e Grandezze della sempre sereniss. Casa Medici..., 1678Finarte, Nov 20-21: Alighieri, Dante - La Divina Commedia di Dante Alighieri con varie annotazioni, e copiosi Rami adornata, 1757Finarte, Nov 20-21: Lot containing 80 printed guides and publications dedicated to travel and itineraries in Italy -
Ketterer Rare Books
Auction November 25thKetterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
H. Schedel, Liber chronicarum, 1493. Est: € 25,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
P. O. Runge, Farben-Kugel, 1810. Est: € 8,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
W. Kandinsky, Klänge, 1913. Est: € 20,000Ketterer Rare Books
Auction November 25thKetterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
W. Burley, De vita et moribus philosophorum, 1473. Est: € 4,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
M. B. Valentini, Viridarium reformatum seu regnum vegetabile, 1719. Est: € 12,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
PAN, 10 volumes, 1895-1900. Est: € 15,000Ketterer Rare Books
Auction November 25thKetterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
J. de Gaddesden, Rosa anglica practica medicinae, 1492. Est: € 12,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
M. Merian, Todten-Tanz, 1649. Est: € 5,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
D. Hammett, Red harvest, 1929. Est: € 11,000Ketterer Rare Books
Auction November 25thKetterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
Book of hours, Horae B. M. V., 1503. Est: € 9,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
J. Miller, Illustratio systematis sexualis Linneai, 1792. Est: € 8,000Ketterer Rare Books, Nov. 25:
F. Hundertwasser, Regentag – Look at it on a rainy day, 1972. Est: € 8,000 -
Sotheby's
Fine Books, Manuscripts & More
Available for Immediate PurchaseSotheby’s: J.R.R. Tolkien. The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. 11,135 USDSotheby’s: Edgar Allan Poe. The Raven and Other Poems, 1845. 33,000 USDSotheby’s: Leo Tolstoy, Clara Bow. War and Peace, 1886. 22,500 USDSotheby’s: Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, 1902. 7,500 USDSotheby’s: F. Scott Fitzgerald. This Side of Paradise, The Great Gatsby, and Others, 1920-1941. 24,180 USD
Rare Book Monthly
Objects of Desire
You can judge a book by its cover
By Bruce McKinney
The human mind is a fabulous and sometimes disordered mechanism. It recognizes the red and green of traffic lights, registers differences of temperature sufficiently to keep us from plunging into icy waters unprepared. It recognizes sunlight when it's too intense and we avert our eyes and it recognizes sirens and flashing lights in the rear view mirror, increasing our blood pressure and instantly organizing our pretexts and excuses into a hopefully convincing narrative while averting our eyes in a way that recognizes authority in an accepting way. We do all these things because we are human and human beings are intelligent.
When we apply this intelligence to the buying of antiques, old books, curios and collectibles all bets are off, at least for some of us. The issue is emotion. I was reminded of this when I recently read Objects of Desire, a book recommended to me as an inhale-able non-fiction account of three antiques' migration from obscurity to the top tier. The book, first printed in 1993, is by Thatcher Freund. Copies are available around the net in paper from $1.00, in hard cover from $3.00. Don't let the prices fool you. It's a great telling.
Every collector will recognize the story in a general way and I'll quote the description given on the bookjacket.
"Among the many desirable objects on offer during the 1991 Americana Week in New York - the annual high point of antiques sales - are three prized pieces. One stands in a spotlight at the Winter Antiques Show: a pine blanket chest made for a farmer in the 1750s and still wearing its original coat of robin's egg blue paint. The asking price is $250,000. A few blocks away, on display at Sotheby's, is a rare Chippendale card table, created in Philadelphia in 1759. The auction house is hoping that bidding for the piece will reach one million dollars. Also on display at Sotheby's is an inland sofa table from the Federal period, valued at $100,000, one of the prized possessions of a collector forced by circumstance to sell his cherished objects.
How these three pieces came to be at the apex of the American antiques market is the story of the evolution of the world of antiques: a world of bold enterprise, canny deal making, consuming aesthetic vision, and obsessive pursuit - all fueled by a passionate attraction to objects."
Exactly. "By a passionate attraction to objects." All of these items survived in very original condition into the modern era where "original condition" emerged as the linqua franca of the quality-phobes. It turns out there are lots of antiques around because nobody throws them out. To then differentiate between run-of-the-mill antiques and exceptional examples the standards adjusted, in my opinion, into a self-serving approach of difficult to explain [or duplicate] judgments and feelings dependent on having a professional eye that no amateur can attain. Except...
