Dorset

This 6½in (16cm) Irish silver gilt chalice dating from c.1480 is a rare survival from before the Reformation.

Works by the Zinkeisen sisters continue to bring demand at auctions around the country.

Dorset auction house Duke’s is creating a heritage and valuations division and has hired a former surveyor of The Queen’s Works of Art to form the new team.

Former Edinburgh Woollen Mill turned into antiques market with more than 40 dealers

A group of Ethiopian works of art believed to have been taken during the Battle of Maqdala in 1868 has been withdrawn from a Dorset auction after the Embassy of Ethiopia intervened.

A collection of Doulton from a West Country farmhouse is included in the Charterhouse July 8-9 auction in Sherborne, Dorset.

Dewlish House yields ‘good old-fashioned house sale with everything on offer’

Duke’s sale of property from Wormington Grange in Gloucestershire included a record for the Modern British painter Algernon Newton (1880-1968).

Venus, the Roman goddess of love and beauty, has been a favourite subject in art since ancient times.

The Winter Antiques Sale at Duke’s (25% buyer’s premium) was topped by consecutive bids of £17,000 each for two Regency white marble busts.

This 3in (7.5cm) brass and ivorine fishing reel is inscribed to the face 'Ustonson & Peters, Makers to the Queen, 48 Bell Yard, Temple Bar, London'.

British wartime Prime Minister Winston Churchill memorabilia in the form of slippers, brandy balloon and cigar box.

A tankard said to be made from the hide of Oliver Cromwell’s warhorse was the toast of an auction in Dorchester.

With all 80 lots getting away – 79 to a single UK collector – a group of walking sticks totalled more than £40,000 at Charterhouse (25% buyer’s premium).

Although now known as Gainsborough chairs, generous walnut and upholstered armchairs were often referred to by contemporaries as ‘French’ chairs, as the most elaborate styles were based on French rococo.

Label, listed provenance and technical qualities lead to a contest to land a possible big Guercino catch.

The mixed-owner element of a recent Onslows’ sale included a William Russell Flint (1890-1969) LNER poster showing Bamburgh Castle.

A ‘superb connoisseur’s collection’ of classic travel posters underlined the appeal of rare works from the biggest names of this genre

The unusual Chinese porcelain model (pictured below) forms the shape of a lingzhi stem vividly enamelled with a blend of green, blue and pink glazes. It measures 9in (23cm) high and carries a Qianlong (1736-95) mark.