landmarks to 1970

This page highlights some landmarks in the sale of old master paintings, stamps, manuscripts, furniture and other collectibles.

It covers -

• pre-1849
• 1850 -
• 1900 -
• 1930 -
• 1950 -
• 1960 -

Context is provided by the broader communications, information technology and media timeline on this site.

Figures are in historic rather than contemporary dollars and pounds. Indication of value are provided by the EH indexes here; Augustus III's payment for a Raphael in 1754 might be the equivalent of US$1.3 billion. Robert Hughes cautioned that such

figures are very impressionistic: converting art prices between sterling and dollars across a time-gap of 200 years is fraught with wild variables and may be no more accurate than the effort to convert wampum to lire.

     pre-1849

1650 Raphael painting - £2,000 (Charles I, King of England)

1754 Sistine Madonna by Raphael - £8,500 (Augustus III, King of Poland & Saxony)

1762 George III buys 53 Canaletto paintings and 140 drawings by Giovanni Antonio Canal aka 'Canaletto' (1697-1768) for £20,000

1799 Landing of Aeneas and The Sacrifice to Apollo by Claude Lorraine - £6,825 (William Beckford)

1812 Christ Healing the Sick by Benjamin West - £3,150

1813 The Lacemaker by Jan Vermeer - £7

1841 Seascape, Folkestone (1840) by Joseph Mallord William Turner - 250 guineas

Giudecca, La Donna della Salute & San Giorgio by JMW Turner - 250 guineas

     1850

1863 Seascape, Folkestone (1840) by Turner - 1,650 guineas

1864 Shakespeare First Folio - £716 (Baroness Burdett-Coutt)

1881 Lady Writing a Letter with her Maid by Vermeer - 60,000 Francs

1896 Rape of Europa by Titian - £288

1870 The Lacemaker by Vermeer - £51 (Louvre)

1874 Nativity by Piero della Francesca - £2,500 (National Gallery)

1875 The Grand Canal by William Mallord Turner - £7,350

1879 Madonna of the Rocks (1508) by Leonardo da Vinci - £9,000 (National Gallery)

1894 The Presentation in the Temple by Giotto - US$7,500 (Isabella Stewart Gardner)

1895 Death of Lucretia by Sandro Botticelli - US$15,000 (Gardner)

1895 Poe's Tamerlane - US$1,450

1896 Rape of Europa by Titian - £21,000 (Gardner)

1897 Seascape, Folkestone (1840) by Turner - 6,800 guineas

1987 Giudecca, La Donna della Salute & San Giorgio by Turner - 6,800 guineas

1898 Romans d’amour et de la jeunesse (1771) by Jean-Honore Fragonard - US$0.35m (JP Morgan)

1898 Bindo Altoviti bust by Benvenuto Cellini - US$50,000

1899 Madonna of the Eucharist by Botticelli - US$65,000

     1900

1902 The Adoration of God the Father tapestry - US$0.5m (Morgan)

1906 Audubon Birds and Quadrupeds - US$4,350

1906 Caxton Morte D'Arthur - US$42,800 (Morgan)

1907 Madonna & Child with Bird in Hand by Perugino - US$10,000

1913 David by Donatello - US$3m (Widener)

1914 Small Cowper Madonna by Raphael - US$0.56m (Widener)

1919 Shakespeare's Venus & Adonis (1599) - £15,100

1919 Poe's Tamerlane - US$11,600

1921 The Blue Boy by Thomas Gainsborough - US$0.72m (Henry Huntington)

1924 Self Portrait by Anthony van Dyck - US$0.13m

1926 Don Manuel Osorio de Zuniga by Fancisco de Goya - US$0.27m

1927 manuscript of Wagner's Das Rheingold - US$15,400

1927 Madonna & Child by Carlo Crivelli - US$0.23m

1928 Francesco Sassetto by Domenico Ghirlandaio - US$0.35m

1929 Luttrell Psalter - £31,500 (British Museum)

     1930

1930 Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer (1653) by Rembrandt van Rijn - US$0.5m (Duveen)

1931 Alba Madonna - US$0.92m (Andrew Mellon)

1933 Codex Sinaiticus - £100,000 (British Museum)

1933 Tickhill Psalter - US$61,000

1947 Bay Psalm Book - US$151,000 (Rosenbach)

1947 Landing of Aeneas and Sacrifice to Apollo by Lorraine - £5,300

1947 Irises (1889) by van Gogh - US$80,000 (Whitney)

1947 Gutenberg Bible - £22,000

1949 Lincoln's final draft of the Gettysburg Address - US$54,000

     1950

1952 Inspeximus version of Magna Carta - £12,500 (Australian government)

1954 The Bar (1954) by John Brack - 90 guineas

1956 Adoration of the Shepherds by Nicolas Poussin - £29,000

1957 Les Usines à Clichy by Vincent van Gogh - £31,000

1958 Jardin Public à Arles by van Gogh - £132,000

1958 Le Garçon au Gilet Rouge by Paul Cézanne - £220,00 (Paul Mellon)

     1960

1961 Aristotle Contemplating the Bust of Homer by Rembrandt - US$2.2m (Metropolitan Museum of Art)

1961 Portrait of the Duke of Wellington by Goya - US$392,000

1967 Times-Sotheby Index launched

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