Ancient CyprusAncient Cyprus

Auction house

Sotheby's

London, United Kingdom

Auction house in London. 32 people in the register connected with it.

History

  1. 9 January 1871 – 10 January 1871
    First London sale of Luigi Palma di Cesnola's Cypriot finds, conducted by Sotheby, Wilkinson & Hodge: 'Catalogue of a very interesting collection of early Greek antiquities ... discovered in the Island of Cyprus'. Masson dates it 9 January; Cesnola's Life and Deeds gives 9-10.

    Luigi Palma di CesnolaMasson 1996Masson 1990Marangou 2000

  2. 1 May 1871 – 2 May 1871
    Second Sotheby sale of Cesnola's finds, 'Catalogue of some most select antiquities obtained from the excavations made in the Island of Cyprus by General de Cesnola'. Buyers named by Masson include W. Loftie, Lord Ranelagh, General Fox (numismatist), Colonel Fox (later Pitt Rivers), Feuardent and Hoffmann. Froehner says he wrote pp. 1-17 of this catalogue. Lot 31, a small amphora with a human face, went to Feuardent and reached Saint-Germain in 1874 (22.231); lots 48 and 142 went to Pitt Rivers.

    Luigi Palma di CesnolaGaston Louis FeuardentHenri HoffmannW. LoftieLord RanelaghGeneral Fox (numismatist)Augustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt RiversWilhelm FroehnerMasson 1996Hellmann 1991Goring 1983

  3. 1871
    Cesnola's letter of 24 November 1871 to Rollin and Feuardent, sending 66 boxes (5,756 items) to London, offered the sale of the whole lot, or auction through Feuardent or through Sotheby's if Sotheby's accepted the costs plus 6% interest for 12-18 months' use of exhibition rooms. The source places this letter in connection with the 1871 sales; its date relative to the January and May sales is not reconciled there.

    Luigi Palma di CesnolaMarangou 2000

  4. 1 June 1883 – 27 April 1892
    Four Sotheby sales of the Lawrence-Cesnola collection (Alessandro Palma di Cesnola's Cypriot finds, owner of record E. H. Lawrence): 1 June 1883 (over 1,000 lots, mostly glass, terracottas and lamps), 15 May 1884, 12 March 1888 and 25 April 1892 (Masson; Morris and Christie's provenance lines give 27 April 1892, a discrepancy). Buyers included Pitt Rivers (693 items per Ulbrich and Kiely), A. J. Lawson, J. E. Preston, Gunn and Jackson. In April 1884 the British Museum bought inscribed stones directly from Lawrence, outside the sales.

    Edwin Henry LawrenceAlessandro (Alexander) Palma di CesnolaAugustus Henry Lane Fox Pitt RiversAlfred John LawsonJohn Emmanuel PrestonGunnJackson (buyer, 1892)MasonMasson 1996Masson 1996Ulbrich & Kiely 2012Reeve 2021, p. 241Morris 1985

  5. 12 December 1933
    Sotheby & Co. sold about 390 objects described as 'Property of Rupert Gunnis, Esq.' (Catalogue of Antiquities, Native Art, etc.). Marion pottery from the 1889 official excavations, sold off by the Cyprus Museum as 'duplicates', was among them (Stanley-Price). In his 1936 statement John Hilton alleged that Gunnis had exported large numbers of antiquities and said some lots were bought for the Ashmolean Museum and the University of London institute, including gold and other jewellery. Smith cites the catalogue in a footnote on Gunnis's Polis excavations.

    LondonRupert Forbes GunnisJohn Linton MyresStanley-Price 2025Childs et al. 2012

  6. 22 November 1974
    Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, sold a Cypriot limestone head of a goddess (lot 209), consigned by the Hagop Kevorkian Fund; the lot was later offered at Christie's (2022, sale 20677, lot 78).

    Hagop KevorkianChristie's 2022, lot 78

  7. 22 December 1975
    Sotheby's London sale (part lot 208) from which Peter Gimpel bought; later at Christie's 2007 (sale 7521, lot 253). Morris records that a 61 cm plank figure arrived in London from Greece in 1975 and was sold at Sotheby's on 14 July (lot 216), bought by a Swiss dealer.

    Peter GimpelDesmond MorrisChristie's 2007, lot 253Morris 1985

  8. 1976
    Sotheby's London sales of 23 February (Base Ring jug DM-BR-26, first sold 1892, bought by Desmond Morris) and 12-13 July (lot 513, the Stella Pitt-Rivers consignment, bought by Nicolas Koutoulakis).

    Desmond MorrisStella Pitt-RiversNicolas KoutoulakisMorris 1985Antiquities, London, 16 December… 2020, lot 15

  9. 9 July 1990
    Sotheby's London sale 'Antiquities from the Erlenmeyer Collection' (lot 12, a Cypriot pyxis); Christie's records the consignor only as the Erlenmeyer collection.

    Hans ErlenmeyerChristie's 2013, lot 64

  10. November 1991
    Yanni Petsopoulos consigned a St John Prodromos icon to the November 1991 Sotheby's sale; it was withdrawn. Hofstadter reports him saying he was not the owner.

    Yanni PetsopoulosHofstadter 1994

  11. 1990s
    Costas Severis acquired five Edmond Duthoit drawings (Buffavento, Kantara) tipped into a copy of Enlart 1899 at a Sotheby's sale, per Bonato (2001); Bonato's text places the sale 'some years' earlier than his article, so the exact date is not fixed.

    Costas SeverisTatton-Brown 2001

People

32 people

Staff and members · 3

Sellers and consignors · 11

Buyers · 16

Others connected · 2

Objects

On Ancient Cyprus

16 pages

Sources

  1. 1.Olivier Masson (1996). “La dispersion des antiquités chypriotes: les deux collections Cesnola”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 25, 3-32. Online
  2. 2.Olivier Masson (1996). “La dispersion des antiquités chypriotes: les deux collections Cesnola”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 25, 3-32. Online
  3. 3.O. Masson (1990). “Correspondances chypriotes: lettres des frères Colonna-Ceccaldi et de L. Palma di Cesnola à W. Froehner”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 14, 29-44. Online
  4. 4.A. G. Marangou (ed.) (2000). The Consul Luigi Palma di Cesnola 1832-1904: Life and Deeds.
  5. 5.Marie-Christine Hellmann (1991). “W. Froehner et Chypre”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 16, 17-28. Online
  6. 6.Elizabeth Sarah Goring (1983). “Late Cypriot Goldwork, vol. 1”. PhD thesis, Bedford College, University of London.
  7. 7.Robert Stuart Merrillees (2016). “Studies on the provenances of the stele of Sargon II from Larnaca (Kition) and the two so-called Dhali (Idalion) silver bowls in the Louvre”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 46, 349-386. Online
  8. 8.Robert S. Merrillees (2017). “Cypriote antiquities in Late Ottoman Istanbul and Smyrna - II: Cypriote antiquities in the Greek Evangelical School Museum and their Trading in Late Ottoman Smyrna (Modern Izmir)”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 47, 121-164. Online
  9. 9.Nicholas Stanley-Price (2025). “Illicit excavation and the sale of 'duplicate' antiquities: Rupert Gunnis and the Cyprus Museum, 1926-1932”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 55, 269-301. Online
  10. 10.W. A. P. Childs (ed.), J. S. Smith (ed.), J. M. Padgett (ed.) (2012). City of Gold: The Archaeology of Polis Chrysochous, Cyprus. Princeton, Princeton University Art Museum.
  11. 11.Anja Ulbrich, Thomas Kiely (2012). “Britain and the Archaeology of Cyprus. I. The long 19th century”. Cahiers du Centre d'Études Chypriotes 42. Online
  12. 12.Anna Holly Reeve (2021). “Ancient Cyprus in Leeds: Objects, Networks and Museums from 1870 to 1947”. PhD thesis, University of Leeds.
  13. 13.Desmond Morris (1985). The Art of Ancient Cyprus, with a check-list of the author's collection. Oxford, Phaidon Press in association with Jonathan Cape.
  14. 14.Dan Hofstadter (1994). Goldberg's Angel: An Adventure in the Antiquities Trade.
  15. 15.Veronica Tatton-Brown (ed.) (2001). Cyprus in the 19th Century AD: Fact, Fancy and Fiction. Oxford, Oxbow.
  16. 16.Christie's (2022). Sale 20677, lot 78.
  17. 17.Christie's (2007). Sale 7521, lot 253.
  18. 18.Christie's (2013). Sale 2755, lot 64.
  19. 19. (2020). Antiquities, London, 16 December 2020 (sale 18864). London, Christie's.