East of England

Paul César Helleu (1859-1927) is best known for his Belle Epoque portraits of beautiful society women.

A growing market for silver from the sub-continent culminated in a bid of £11,500 for this 9in (23cm) early 20th century Burmese bowl by Maung Yin Maung of Rangoon.

An embossed brass belt buckle discovered in the back garden of an old English cottage is a reminder that the very first Australian side to tour England was one made up entirely of Aborigines.

The medal group awarded to the captain of the Lusitania on its final voyage, William Turner, is on offer at Lockdales of Ipswich, Suffolk.

This superbly patinated Shona hardwood headrest sold for £23,000 at only the second auction at new Stowmarket saleroom Bishop & Miller.

This spectacular barn find, an ebonised coromandel and inlaid octagonal centre table designed by Edward Godwin (1833-86), sold for £31,000 at Sworders’ sale of decorative art and design in Stansted Mountfitchet.

A picture stolen from a Hertfordshire house three years ago and recently recovered sold at an Essex auction last week for £80,000.

The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge have promised to reveal more evidence backing the attribution to Michelangelo of a pair of bronze figures of two nude males riding panthers.

A superb combination of history, condition and rarity came together as a figurehead from a Brazilian slavers’ ship sold at Essex saleroom Sworders for ten times the low estimate at £50,000.

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

This sixth issue Elizabeth I sovereign (1584-1586) was among seven English 16th and 17th century gold coins stolen from a dealer’s home in Norfolk in August.

When Stephen Drake of Willingham Auctions discovered a 3000-year-old Egyptian coffin cover in a house clearance on the Essex coast, he was amazed.

The opening lots of a recent sale at Reeman Dansie of Colchester comprised a collection of Chinese porcelain which included a rare bowl that was apparently a favourite resting place for the family cat.

It’s only recently in the decade-long boom in Chinese works of art that Far Eastern buyers have come to appreciate once again the merits of Export silver. Once a neglected area, academic interest has been piqued in the subject as the marketplace moves in leaps and bounds.

A massive Coalport Feldspar porcelain jug painted with a study of Earl Spencer’s Durham Ox in a parkland setting has been bought by the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge.

Seventeenth century Dublin trefid spoons are extremely scarce. Last year a single rat-tailed example by Andrew Gregory, 1685, sold for €9000 at Adams of Dublin.

Trading from the Arts Museum in Cockspur Street, the famous James Giles (1718-80) china and glass decorating atelier produced an enormous diversity of bijouterie for the London luxury trade.

The latest Asian art sale at Sworders in Stansted Mountfitchet was led by this massive 9½in (24.5cm) high Chinese calligrapher’s brush pot dating to the late 18th or early 19th century.

An item with an interesting local connection which is for sale at this Saturday’s Norwich Fleamarket is a rare Victorian large folio of European brass rubbings collected by a Norwich cleric.

This Qianlong mark and period hat or wig stand sold for a massive £360,000 at a recent Cheffins sale in Cambridge.