Antique Maps & Prints: Auctions & News, Week of 2.27.06

Bloomsbury Auctions Printed Books. March 2, 2006

Items of interest to the antique maps and prints collector begin with lot 326 in the Travel section. An unusual Military Topographical Map of the Krima Peninsula published in 1855 is offered (lot 342, 200-300 GBP estimate); A Series of Adventures in the Course of a Voyage up the Red Sea... by Irwin, with 3 folding maps (lot 350, 100-150 GBP); Samuel Lewis's Atlas Comprising the Counties of Ireland, published 1837 (lot 361, 200-300 GBP); a selection of works on angling, many with color plates (lots 371-378), and J. S. Heger's Herbarium Pharmaceuticum, published 1822-1825 and containing 140 hand-colored engraved plates (lot 393, 200-300 GBP). Visit Bloomsbury's online catalog for more details.

Heritage Auction Galleries Gala and Texana Auction. March 4, 2006

This is an auction on behalf of the Texas State Historical Association, and promises to be a major event. Quoting from the introduction to their catalog, the auction includes books, documents, manuscripts, paintings, and art, all with a Texas theme. The auction, while not exclusively "high-end" material, does contain plenty of cartographic material with hefty presale estimates. For example: lot 1007, J. De Cordova's Map of the State of Texas, 1851, estimate $80-100,000; a rare Birds-eye View of Indianola, 1860 (lot 1015, estimate $10-15,000), and Mitchell's New Map of Texas, Oregon and California, with the Regions Adjoining, pocket map, 1846 (lot 1028, estimate $12,500-17,000). Too rich for your wallet? How about lot 1102, Map of Stephen's County, Texas, circa 1870, by the Texas Pacific Railroad Company, estimated at just $500-750? Whatever your resources, or just for an enjoyable browse, visit their online catalog. The descriptions are well-researched, and the sale contains many items you won't see at auction very often.

Old World Auctions Sale 114 Running Through March 1, 2006

Old World Auctions quarterly sale, with online bidding available, is open until March 1. You can see our review of the auction in last week's blog.

Upcoming Events

February 27, London. The annual Collector's Evening at the International Map Collector's Society, chaired by the renowned Rodney Shirley.

March 2-4, Chicago. A conference entitled Early American Cartographies at the Newberry Library. Follow the link for the impressive list of sponsors, and registration information.

March 3-4, Washington, D. C. The Washington Antiquarian Book Fair, where you will undoubtedly find plenty of antique maps, antique prints, and historical cartographic material.


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Antique Maps & Prints: News, Auctions, Events

Old World Auctions Sale 114 Now Online

Old World Auctions quarterly sale is now online and open for bidding. The auction closes on Wednesday, March 1 at 10 pm Eastern time. This is always a good auction for antique map collectors, with wide selections and excellent condition reports by Curt and Marti Griggs. This time, according to their online catalog introduction, the sale features a good selection of Colonial Period maps; maps featuring the island of California; Western U.S. exploration, and much more. Atlases for auction include works by Hondius, de Fer, Dufour, Finley, Mitchell, Beers, Walling, and more. Highlights include a scarce world map by de Wit (lot 22, estimate $7-9,000); a double-hemisphere world map by Montanus (lot 24, estimate $5-8,000); an unusual map of the Americas by Sanson, labelled Atlantis, (lot 78, estimate $1,100-1,400); Bowen's scarce map of Georgia, circa 1748, (lot 168, $3-3,500); A. L. Bancroft's scarce pocket map of California and western states (lot 200, estimate $2,500-3,000), and the scarce State of Sequoyah (Oklahoma) issued in 1905 (lot 263, $7-900). Well worth a visit to the site, offering online absentee bidding and other bidding methods.

PBA Galleries Rare Books & Manuscripts Sale, Feb. 23

Not all items in this PBA Galleries auction are relevant to antique maps and prints, but there is more than enough to make their website worth a visit, including a 1780 world atlas by Bonne (lot 24, estimate $2-3,000); a rare, 1808 botanical work by Candolle, incomplete as to the plates (lot 35, estimate $1,500-2,500); Cook's Voyage to the Pacific, first edition, 1784, with atlas plates bound in, (estimate $10-15,000); Anne Everard's Flowers from Nature, 1835, with 13 handcolored lithographs (lot 62, estimate $1,000-1,500); a rare work by Alexander Geraldinus, written in 1524 but published in 1631, on the discovery of the West Indies (lot 90, estimate $5-8,000); La Perouse's Voyages, 1799, (lot 122, $8-12,000) and Thomas Salmon's Universal Traveller, 1752-53 (lot 164, $4-6,000). A very nice feature of PBA Galleries auctions is that they offer live, online bidding during the auction.

Aspire Auctions online February 24 - March 4

An online auction house we have not previously previewed is Aspire Auctions. Their format appears similar to that of Old World Auctions, ie an online auction which remains open for bidding (and rebidding) over an extended period of time. Their auction beginning February 24 is not solely devoted to antique maps and prints. However, they have a "works on paper" section where we spied some octavo Audubon prints, and also an Autographs, Maps, Books & Documents section that contained some cartographic material. Worth a visit to the site.

Upcoming Events

February 21. The Rocky Mountain Map Society meets at 6:30 pm in the Denver Public Library, 5th Floor, Gates Room. Wes Brown will discuss How the 1859 Gold Rush put Colorado on the Map.

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This Week In Antique Maps & Prints

Auction Preview Week of February 13, 2006

The week begins with the Dorothy Sloan auctions in Los Angeles on February 15. To be precise, there are 3 auctions on one day: A California Gold Rush auction; Voyages and Travels with an Emphasis on Captain Cook; and Texas, California, the Southwest U.S., Mexico & the Borderlands: Interesting books, broadsides, maps & ephemera. Dorothy Sloan auctions, which take place roughly annually, are always extremely notable affairs in the world of antique maps, since the consignments typically include rare, difficult-to-find, and often breathtaking items. There are far too many wonderful items to do justice to in a blog -- if American cartography is your interest, you will not want to miss browsing their online catalogs. How about this item: from the Texas et al sale -- lot 68. Zebulon Pike's: An Account of Expeditions to the Sources of the Mississippi and through the Western Parts of Louisiana, to the Sources of the Arkansaw, published in 1810 in Philadelphia. First edition of the first U.S. government exploration of the Southwest. The maps, the first of the Southwest to be based on firsthand exploration, are considered “milestones in the mapping of the American West” (Wheat). Presale estimate: $35,000-70,000. Although most of the lots are not in that price range, that's the kind of treasure you can expect at a Dorothy Sloan auction. Check it out -- and be sure to enjoy the absolutely magnificent assemblage of rare American pocket maps.

Next up is a sale at Bloomsbury Auctions in London, with their Topography, Travel, Science, Medicine and Natural History auction on Feb. 16. The sale includes a good number of books relating to topography and travel in the English counties. Lot 25 caught my eye: The Antiquities of Warwickshire Illustrated, folio first edition, by Sir William Dugdale. with 5 folding/double-page engraved maps, and 11 engraved plates on 10 sheets, published in 1656. The estimate is 750-1,000 GB Pounds. I also liked lot 32, Gilbert (Charles Sandoe) An Historical Survey of the County of Cornwall, by Charles Gilbert, published in 1817 in London. Presale estimate is 300-400 GB Pounds. The sale goes on to offer travel books from around the world, including polar regions, and some desirable books of voyages, including Cook and Hakluyt. Worth a click to their website.

On the 19th of the month there's a Fine Books and Manuscripts sale at Bonham's in Los Angeles. An interesting item we spotted is lot 1036, John Bennett's A Selection from the Most Remarkable and Interesting of the Fishes found on the Coast of Ceylon. Published in London in 1834, with 30 hand-colored, engraved plates of exotic fishes. Presale estimate is $3,000-4,000. Don't blink, because 2 lots later comes John Cassin's Illustrations of the Birds of California, Texas, Oregon, British and Russian America. With 50 hand-colored lithographs, this 1853 first edition, said to be in excellent condition, is tagged at $3,000-5,000 presale.

Other Events Relating To Antique Maps

February 16, 2006. Washington, D.C. The Washington Map Society meets at 7:00 pm in the Geography and Map Division, B level, Library of Congress.

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This Week In Antique Maps & Prints

Auction Preview Week of Feb. 6, 2006

Very little auction action this week, probably due in part to the fact that almost everyone in the antique map business is in Miami for the map fair. (See below). Keep an eye on the blog for the week of February 13, when we will be previewing antique map and print auctions including the always fabulous, annual auction from Dorothy Sloan Books, and a Travel and Natural History auction from Bloomsbury Auctions.


Thirteenth Annual Map Fair Underway

Every winter brings the marvelous International Map Fair, now in its 13th year, hosted by the Historical Museum Of Southern Florida. I was able to attend back in 1998, and the event has grown in stature and attendance ever since. It's a great event for antique map lovers, with lectures, programs, "expert opinions," and offerings for sale from several dozen antique maps and prints dealers.

Got News About Antique Maps or Prints?

Let us know. You can either post to this blog yourself, or you can email ncstreet@vintagemaps.com with your information. News, events, lectures, opinions, programs, auctions...etc, etc.

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