The ABAA’s San Francisco Book Fair has come and gone and participants returned home, left for vacation or moved on to the next show. For book collectors and institutions these shows are special events, for dealers part of the modern formula for meeting clients and selling books. By most accounts the show met or exceeded expectations. Certainly the telltale signs of a good show; a seamless process, good attendance, and anecdotal evidence of satisfactory to robust sales, suggest a successful event that portends well short-term but casts little light on the future. Such is the state of th...
“The future of internet antiquarian bookselling,” says Dan Gregory “is certainly not with companies like ABE or Amazon. They don't know anything about antiquarian books themselves, and they don't o...
At the recent ABAA Fair in San Francisco desire and logic met head on when I saw a very nice copy of Burr’s New York Atlas. It is apparently the 3rd or 4th edition that has the Ithaca, New York in...
Two major stories have come out of America's second largest chain of bookstores, and while the two are technically unrelated, they are very intertwined. A few weeks ago, Borders announced that they...
Powell's Books, the large Portland, Oregon, retail store and online bookseller recently announced that it would be laying off 31 employees. This represents 7% of its unionized workforce. This numbe...
Many of you are now subscribers to the AE Database (and we hope many more will join them soon). The AE Database is a compilation of bibliographic records, primarily taken from auctions, both recent...
When you look at an AE page the chances are very high that what you see and the sequence of things you see are unique to you. You may prioritize the site by color, size of words or by the words th...
The news arrived on page D2 of the ever-thinner San Francisco Chronicle on Friday 25th that “Thunderbolt ups new MacBook’s speed, power.” The story focuses on a new technology – Thunderbolt – “to ...
A census for all copies of the subscribers' edition (1926) of T.E. Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom is now underway. T.E. Lawrence is better known as Lawrence of Arabia, a British officer who adv...
There is an exhibition taking place at the Yale Law Library, Life and Law in Early Modern England, celebrating British life in the Elizabethan Age. It is being put on by the Lillian Goldman Law Lib...
This has been a busy month for book catalogue writers. We have 20 new ones up for review. Yeoman's in the Fork has issued their first catalogue. Simon Beattie Antiquarian Books and Music has issued...
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
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.
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.