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It hardly qualifies as a book, but the data card book in which Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin recorded critical values for input into the lunar module computer during the Apollo XI mission of 1969, autograph data that enabled them to make the first moon landing, certainly qualifies as an historical technical document.

THE London Irish sales are the annual litmus test of the very top end of the Irish picture market. Upcoming at the time of writing, this year’s sales at Christie’s and Sotheby’s (May 15 and 16) seem to lack the numbers of big hitting pictures seen over the past ten years, reflecting the reluctance of vendors to come into today’s nervous market in which estimates are based upon realities rather than the wishful thinking that used to be good enough.

AFTER the successful sale of items consigned by the Austrian State Tobacco Museum to Wiener Kunst in Vienna last October, European pipemen had another chance to add to their collections when nearly 500 pipes and pipe bowls came under the hammer at Tajan (14.35% - 20.33 % buyer’s premium) on April 26.

THE NAME of Jean-Baptiste de Machault d’Arnouville (1701-94), Finance and Navy Minister under Louis XV, provided lustrous provenance to the top lots at the sale of art and furniture held by Beaussant-Lefèvre (14.35-17.94% buyer’s premium) at Drouot on April 25.

ON the same day as Whyte’s Dublin sale, the Irish theme continued this side of the water at Essex when Sworders (15 per cent buyer’s premium) offered a drawing by Sir William Orpen (1878-1931) at their Stansted Mountfichet rooms on April 29 – a 16 by 14in (40 x 35cm) signed pencil and coloured washes piece entitled The Furniture Painter.

THERE was a collective sigh of relief in the New York salerooms last week when, after a long period of uncertainty following the war in Iraq and turmoil in the stockmarkets, both Sotheby’s and Christie’s held impressive Part I Impressionist and Modern sales. Any fears that anti-French feeling would spill over in the salerooms proved unfounded after French artists took the top honours at both houses.

IT’S hard to say whether modern studio potters find the Della Robbia story inspiring or depressing. Established by Harold Rathbone and Conrad Dressler in Birkenhead in 1894, in its 12-year operation the factory became a key part of the Arts and Crafts movement but also went broke.

WILLIAM S. ‘Bill’ Bertoia, antique toy authority and founder of Bertoia Auctions in New Jersey, has died at the age of 52, after battling with cancer.

MAGRITTE'S Oiseau du Ciel, pictured right, commissioned by Belgium’s Sabena airline in 1965, was sold at auction in Brussels on May 5 for a triple-estimate €3.4m (£2.3m).

FOR more than one reason, one might have expected the latest series of Islamic works of art sales in London to be a downbeat affair. Added to the prevailing economic gloom, this could surely be a sector of the market where the war in Iraq and its aftermath would have a depressive effect on prices.

SLEEPERS among saleroom sections of Oriental ceramics are a regular feature at auctions around the country and at Charterhouse Auctioneer's 28 March auction (15% buyer's premium) one came in the form of a late 18th/early 19th century Chinese lotus bowl.

SPECIALIST collector markets provided the highlights at Locke & England's Warwickshire salerooms where the 524-lot mixed sale on April 3 (12.5% buyer's premium) included sections catering to special interests in textiles, 20th century pottery and porcelain, toys and games and novelty silver.

A TIMELY debut for a garden and architectural items section at Andrew Hartley's April 9-10 sale (10% buyer's premium) brought in private buyers who usually fire this market but also a specialist who spotted a sleeper – a pair of carved oak corbels, each depicting the head of a cherub over an acanthus leaf and scroll base.

WHILST the rest of the antiques trade has taken a marked downturn, niche collecting areas remain largely unaffected. This was proved when the March 29 sale held by David Stanley Auctions (10% buyer's premium), specialist Leicestershire tool auctioneers, went on to be one of their best ever.

THERE were suppressed cries of irritation from the public at the May 8 sale held in Madrid by Alcalá Subastas as the Spanish State pre-empted all the important lots of the evening, including two newly-discovered paintings by Goya.

BRITANNIA Chapmans, the firm of removal specialists serving major auction houses, museums and art galleries, are celebrating 100 years in business.

The regular specialist carpets and textiles sales at Salisbury auctioneers Woolley & Wallis (15% buyer’s premium) have shown what can be achieved in the provinces even in the most esoteric subjects, and the latest 560-lot event put together by June Barrett and Ian Bennett on April 10 underlined this. War in the Middle East seemed more likely than most to hit this market, but after a creditable 60 per cent turnover and a total just shy of £100,000, June Barrett was more than happy.

THE Hindenburg archive, which includes the famous Leica and accessories recovered from the wreckage by Fritz Deeg, the steward onboard the airship when disaster struck on May 6, 1937, is being offered by WestLicht on May 23 and 24.

BATTERSEA dealer Robert Young, the country’s only specialist in English and European folk art, holds his fourth annual Exhibition of Antique Folk Art from May 16 to 24 at his showrooms at 68 Battersea Bridge Road, London SW11.

ON Sunday, 18th May 2003, antiques enthusiasts can have their objects of virtue, jewellery and paintings appraised at Chilworth Manor, Chilworth, from 11:00am to 4:00pm.