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The burden of proof in CITES court cases should now switch from the defence to the prosecution, says a lawyer who has just won an important victory on the matter.

Lawyer ANDREW BANKS reviews three recent CITES cases and considers what we might learn from them...

“It is a somewhat incoherent narrative, which, however, gives Lon Chaney an opportunity to turn up in an uncanny disguise and also to manifest his powers as Scotland Yard’s expert hypnotist. You are therefore treated to close-ups of Mr Chaney’s rolling orbs, which, fortunately, do not exert their influence on the audience.”

One of the best-loved of all of E.H. Shepard’s illustrations to the famous A.A. Milne books has set a saleroom record after selling for £260,000.

The stock of the Austrian-born British studio potter Lucie Rie (1902-95) continues to rise in the saleroom.

Guidance issued this month by the authorities charged with implementing New York’s latest ivory laws has offered a few crumbs of comfort to art dealers and owners of antique ivory works of art.

One of the greatest ‘barn finds’ ever has uncovered 60 classic cars – just one of which is a rare Ferraris valued at several million pounds – in outbuildings in the west of France.

Pre-war delivery vans advertising commercial brand names have long acquired trophy status in the Dinky toy market.

It was, say Timeline Auctions, “probably the most important medieval seal to come to market” and certainly the most important object the firm had ever offered for sale, according to CEO Brett Hammond.

The outstanding lot of the latest Old Master auction series in London, ‘Rome, from Mount Aventine’ by J.M.W. Turner (1775-1851), was knocked down at £27m at Sotheby’s evening sale, setting a record price for the artist.

James Watson’s 1962 award for his work on DNA set a world record price for a Nobel Prize Medal at Christie’s in New York when it sold for $4.1m (£2.6m) hammer.

Nantwich auctioneers Peter Wilson set a new house record at their latest sale with this large Qianlong (1736-95) mark-and-period doucai ‘lotus and bats’ jar and cover.

This copper-gilt coffin plate, bearing an inscription in Latin with the dates of Oliver Cromwell’s birth, death and inauguration as Lord Protector and the arms of the Protectorate to the reverse, was found when his body was exhumed from the Henry VII chapel at Westminster Abbey on January 26, 1661.

Among the most important Asian works of art to come to market in the modern collecting era, an Imperial Ming dynasty embroidered silk thangka sold for HK$310m (£27m) at a Christie’s latest Chinese art series in Hong Kong.

The Kunstmuseum Bern’s announcement that it would accept the Gurlitt bequest (aside from any Nazi-looted art) has been followed by a pledge by Germany’s culture minister to return the disputed Matisse and other works to the families of their original owners.

Christie’s New York are offering the 1962 Nobel Prize gold medal awarded to Dr James D. Watson, one of the world’s greatest living scientists.

A project to create a free, comprehensive photo catalogue online of all the sculptures held in UK public collections has moved a step closer thanks to a £2.84m pledge of support from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

The £40,000 corkscrew with an old London Bridge connection sold by auctioneers Reeman Dansie on November 26 is an extremely rare Victorian patent.

Lady Jane Franklin (1791-1875) gained worldwide admiration for her efforts to trace her husband’s disappearance on his fatal 1845 voyage seeking the North West Passage.

Arguably the most famous historic figure in French history and a princely provenance proved an irresistible combination earlier this month in France when a collection of Napoleonic memorabilia formed by the Grimaldi dynasty of Monaco went under the hammer.