Auction Highlights
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Egyptian Granite Head of a Dignitary
Sold for (Inc. bp): £28,600
Carved with soft facial features and carefully executed cosmetic lines around the eye, earring, and carefully detailed duplex wig with gently wavy curls; likely from the Ramesside Period; mounted on a custom-made stand. -
Etruscan Bronze Statuette of Herakles
Sold for (Inc. bp): £18,200
Modelled in the round with a muscular nude body, his club resting on his shoulder and the hair dressed in rows of tight, close-set curls underneath the Nemean lionskin hood with cloak billowing over his left arm, the paws tied across his chest; mounted on a custom-made display stand. -
Roman Marble Portrait of a Boy as Worshipper of Isis
Sold for (Inc. bp): £17,550
Carved head of a prepubescent worshipper of Isis, with soft facial features, long nose, small downturned mouth, heavy-lidded eyes, the whole giving the face a sombre or mournful appearance; the hair textured to indicate a short cut and combed forward across the scalp, sidelock above the right ear; mounted on a 16th century carved breccia upper body with leather cuirass and pteruges to right shoulder, cloak draped across the shoulders and fastened at the clavicle on the right side with a disc-brooch; socle base; some restoration. -
Larger Than Life-Size Roman Bronze Sandaled Foot
Sold for (Inc. bp): £39,000
Modelled in the round and originally part of a monumental statue, the naturalistic right foot encased in a trochades leather sandal with median reversed tongue secured with side straps and thick looped laces; the thick platform sole slightly curved, toes and nails well defined; mounted on a substantial custom-made display stand. -
Life-Size Roman Marble Sleeping Girl from a Sarcophagus Lid
Sold for (Inc. bp): £20,800
Modelled in the half-round, nude with eyelids half-closed in sleep; a drapery partly covering the head and wrapping around the lower body under the hips; the hairstyle similar to those of the Antonine Dynasty, the peaceful face supported by the hands and the ear pierced to accept an earring; iron reinforcing rod to the feet and the right arm's armilla a later replacement; upper head restored in Parian marble. -
Byzantine Porphyry Relief with Cross Surrounded by Two Birds
Sold for (Inc. bp): £28,600
An imposing panel divided to four sections by a central cross on a stepped pedestal, the lower and upper arm with branch-like extensions; the upper quadrants with a circlet surrounding a palm tree-shaped motif; each lower quadrant with a bird in profile facing back; mounted on a custom-made display stand. -
Carved Marble Memento Mori Skull
Sold for (Inc. bp): £16,900
Carved skull on a short neck with musculature and blood vessels; mandible in place with some teeth in sockets, wisps of hair adhering to the dome of the skull; one zygomatic bone partly absent; square-section socle base. -
'The Kelton' Gandharan Head of a Bodhisattva
Sold for (Inc. bp): £24,700
Carved in the half-round head of a Bodhisattva (probably Maitreya) with fine detailing to the arched brow, aquiline nose, neat moustache and full lips; the eyes heavily lidded, urna to the forehead, long open lobes to the ears; the hair in multi-stranded curling locks gathered into an ushnisha with brow-band below; heavily cleaned, conserved, and mounted on a custom-made stand; supplied with original old wooden base with collector's label: 'Head of Bodhisattva / Fine grain schist / Gandhara, Northwest Pakistan / 4th century'.
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Natural History - Amber Group with Insect Inclusions
Oligocene Period, circa 45 million years B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £91
Comprising ten specimens of polished amber with insect inclusions. 23 grams total, 19-34 mm
From a North American collection. Property of an East Sussex, UK, gentleman. -
Natural History - Polished Fossil Cleoniceras Ammonite Pair
Jurassic Period, circa 199-145 million year B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £52
Cut Cleoniceras sp. ammonite, polished to reveal the distinctive structure of the chambers. 375 grams total, 11-11.2 cm
From Madagascar. From a Lincolnshire, UK, collection. -
Natural History - 'Australia' Polished Stromatolite Block
Jerrinah Formation, circa 2.63 billion years B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £33
A Neo-Archean stone block polished on one face, showing the various rock formations. 240 grams, 10.4 cm
From Pilbara, Western Australia. Ex Australian market. From a Leicestershire, UK, collection. -
Natural History - Historic 'Rudna Copper Mine, Lubin, Poland' Gypsum Mineral Specimen
Sold for (Inc. bp): £33
Consisting of large prismatic crystals protruding from a bed of smaller crystals, collection number 610, with an old Geologisch Centrum label. 156 grams, 11 cm
Acquired on the UK mineral and fossil market, since 1970. From the historic mineral collection of Richard Valentine Cain, London, UK, thence by descent. Accompanied by an original historic index file card. -
Natural History - Medium Agate Crystal Geode End Group [3]
Sold for (Inc. bp): £3
Each with polished face displaying brown, grey and orange banding. 1.45 kg total, 13-15 cm
From Brazil. Ex Mineral Imports, London, UK. Gregory, Bottley & Lloyd (Gregory's). -
Natural History - Large Brown Calcite Specimen Group [10]
Sold for (Inc. bp): £7
Comprising large cut chunks. 2.76 kg total, 64-80 mm
From Mexico. Ex Mineral Imports, London, UK. Gregory, Bottley & Lloyd (Gregory's). -
Natural History - Historic Fossil Collection
Devonian-Eocene Period, circa 419-33 million years B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £33
Comprising: two echinoidea, matrix with crinoids, a petrified whale bone, ammonite, a large ammonite fragment, two brachiopods, five ammonite fragments, and a seashell; most with old handwritten labels. 632 grams total, 10-65 mm
Acquired on the UK mineral and fossil market, since 1970. From the historic mineral collection of Richard Valentine Cain, London, UK, thence by descent. -
Natural History - Historic 'Kop Krom Mine, Kop Daglari, Turkey' Kammererite Mineral Specimen
Sold for (Inc. bp): £33
Featuring small crystals on a dark grey matrix, collection number 547; purchased for £32.00 from Gregory, Bottley & Lloyd, in the 1980s, with an old label. 75.2 grams, 47 mm
Acquired on the UK mineral and fossil market, since 1970. From the historic mineral collection of Richard Valentine Cain, London, UK, thence by descent. Accompanied by an original historic index file card. -
Natural History - Baby Woolly Rhinoceros Upper Rear Milk Tooth
Ice Age, 50,000-20,000 years B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £26
With substantial roots. 66 grams, 59 mm
From Yakutsk, Permafrost Region, Siberia. Acquired from an old Dutch collection. From the private collection of an East Anglian, UK, collector. -
Natural History - Polished Copal with Insects
Carboniferous Period, circa 3 million years B.P.Sold for (Inc. bp): £26
A large rod with multiple insect and other inclusions. 27 grams, 15.5 cm
From a Cambridgeshire, UK, collection. -
Natural History - Historic Large Cut and Polished Agate Mineral Specimen Pair
Sold for (Inc. bp): £7
Cut in two halves with the cut faces polished to emphasise the brown and grey banding, collection number 332. 2.27 kg total, 11.8-12 cm
Acquired on the UK mineral and fossil market, since 1970. From the historic mineral collection of Richard Valentine Cain, London, UK, thence by descent. Accompanied by an original historic index file card. -
Natural History - Diogenite NWA 5480 Meteorite Slice
Found 2008 A.D.Sold for (Inc. bp): £52
A cut slice of scarce achondrite from the diogenite group recorded as: Northwest Africa 5480; displayed in a Swiss membrane box. 11.7 grams, 48 mm (58 grams total, 99 x 75 including case)
From the Sahara, N.W. Africa. Ex Hupe collection, U.S.A. From a Leicestershire, UK, collection.
The total known mass of the meteorite found in Mali was 4.91 kg. Mineralogically, the diogenites are primarily composed of magnesium-rich orthopyroxene, with minor amounts of plagioclase and olivine. The pyroxenes are usually coarse-grained, suggesting a cumulate origin for the diogenites in magma chambers within the deeper regions of Vesta's crust. The achondrites of this group are named after a 5th century B.C. Greek philosopher Diogenes of Apollonia, who was the first to suggest that meteorites originate from outer space.