Book

Top lot in a recent sale conducted by Galerie Bassenge (23% buyer’s premium) of Berlin, at €140,000 (£121,800), was a 1687 first issue of Newton’s 'Principia mathematica….'

This set of 10 detective novels is by ‘Jim Dollar’, the pseudonym of Soviet author Marietta Shaginian (1888-1982), whose writing is described as ‘satirical fantasy fiction’.

Essay warns about considerable perils of the ‘indecent custom’ of burials in churchyards

First editions of all of Jane Austen’s major works featured in a sale last month held by Swann Galleries (25/20/12% buyer’s premium).

Offered very early on in the books section of the Travel & Exploration sale at Bonhams (27.5/25/20/13.9% buyer’s premium), a 24-lot collection relating to George Anson amassed by the late Colin Paul, a descendant of the admiral, attracted considerable interest.

A copy of Sylvia Plath’s 'The Bell Jar' in a well-preserved dust jacket sold for £3000 in a recent Surrey auction may have set a record for any uninscribed or association copy.

A copy of JRR Tolkien’s 'The Hobbit' offered in a recent Surrey sale was a first-impression one of 1937, but essentially defined by its truly sad and defective condition.

A remarkable collection of books from The Birmingham Assay Office Library will be offered at Forum Auctions in London on March 26.

Published anonymously in Boston in 1828, a copy of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s youthful first book, 'Fanshawe', sold for $38,000 (£28,790) at Bonhams New York (27.5/25/20/13.9%).

Two men have pleaded guilty in connection with the theft of rare books and manuscripts from the Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

‘Long and intensive build-up’ on Facebook brings in younger buyers to one-day event, writes Jeremy Carson.

A superb copy of Henry Hexham’s 'Principles of the Art Militarie' of 1637 was last seen at Sotheby’s in April 1919, as part of the library of the Earl of Chesterfield.

Bid just short of the high estimate to sell at £56,000 in a Dominic Winter (20% buyer’s premium) sale was a rare complete set in 25 original parts of John Gould’s 'Monograph of the Trochilidae, or Family of Humming Birds' of 1849-61.

The binding of a copy of 'Vocabularis rerum' of Wenceslaus Brack sold in a recent West Sussex sale was a 19th century one and now broken, but this was in its time a very popular and much reprinted work.

A selection of books relating to conjuring dating back to the 17th century is one of the features of the latest Potter & Potter Magic sale to be held on December 14 in Chicago.

Though the splendid but incomplete copy of Jakob Christoph Trew’s 'Hortus nitidissims… floribus' previewed in ATG No 2018 got close to the high estimate in selling at £85,000 as part of the opening, natural history section of a recent London sale, a number of other top lots failed to find buyers.

Although Charles Dickens is often credited with creating the ‘modern’ Christmas, some of the recognition should go to John Leech.