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Shown right is a previously unknown miniature Book of Hours illuminated by Simon Bening, whose contemporary reputation as “the best master in the art of illumination in all Europe” has remained unchallenged over five centuries.

“Good but second-rate Old Master paintings bought for their images rather than their names” was an accurate enough assessment by auctioneer Richard Kay of the pictures on offer in Lawrence’s (15% buyer’s premium) July 16 sale of the contents of Horsington Manor, Templecombe, Somerset on July 16.

The well-documented English love of teddy bears was the main feature of the June 27 sale of the toys, dolls, bears and juvenilia sale at the Knowle rooms of Phillips (15% buyer’s premium).

Some 15 years ago figurative painter Claudia Williams (born 1933) and her husband, artist Gwilym Prichard, left North Wales to settle in France. It was not long before they made their mark on the French art scene, their work being represented in many shows and each being awarded the Silver Medal by the Academy of Arts, Science and Letters, Paris in 1995.

Judith Miller: Antiques Hunter’s Guide to Europe. ISBN 1840283343. £16.99

The mixed medley that constitutes Christie’s South Kensington’s (17.5/10% buyer’s premium) periodic sales of mechanical music and technical apparatus can regularly be expected to include a selection of sewing machines, typewriters, phonographs, gramophones and various incarnations of musical boxes.

UK: Potential clash with summer Olympia - Date changes at two of next year’s Antiques For Everyone fairs have thrown the early summer fairs schedule of a number of dealers into disarray.