Aristocrat’s car boot sale fetches £730k
The sale of artefacts from the attics of Dunrobin Castle smashed pre-auction estimates, writes
IT had been labelled a treasure trove of artefacts that would befit a car boot sale at Downton Abbey.
Now the items from the attics of one of Scotland’s grandest castles have fetched a staggering £732,528 at auction in Edinburgh.
Some 416 lots from Dunrobin Castle near Golspie in Sutherland were sold under instruction from the 25th Earl of Sutherland in an effort to declutter the “most magnificent building in the north of Scotland”.
Objects hidden away in the property for generations ranged from a pair of 18th-century, all-metal flintlock belt pistols made by Alexander Campbell of Doune, in Perthshire, which fetched £44,000, to a pair of taxidermy brown trout, sold for £1,020.
Bonhams hailed the Dunrobin Attic Sale as “one of the highlights of the auction year in the UK”.
The total sum was more than double the pre-sale estimate as bidders from around the world clamoured for a piece of history over a marathon 11 hours -with four auctioneers taking turns on the rostrum until the sale’s conclusion just before 9pm on Tuesday.
Charlie Thomas, Bonhams’ director of house sales, said: “This treasure trove from the atmospheric attics and cellars of Dunrobin Castle is one of the most extraordinary sales I have ever worked on.
“These wonderfully diverse objects were held in a time capsule that evoked a bygone age.”
The sale also included unusual objects, such as a portrait of “The Vampire” by diplomat Frederick Hamilton-temple-blackwood, which made more than five times its £500 estimate when it was sold for £2,805; a pottery four-tiered oyster stand that made £4,462; and a collection of Victorian ice-cream moulds that made a cool £1,020.
Even a collection of 20 chamber pots was snapped up for £700 while a
19th-century tiger skin rug fetched £4,462 and a 19th-century cast-iron cannon valued at £100-£150 made over 10 times that sum, at £2,295.
Mr Thomas added: “Dunrobin Castle has attics 10 times the size of most people’s houses.
“When something becomes redundant, you just put it up in the attic or down in the cellars and forget about it.mthese items are now a tangible connection to life both upstairs and downstairs in the grandest and most historic castle in the north of Scotland.
“Nobody keeps a chamber pot under their bed anymore -- but they do make excellent flower pots.”
The 13th-century seat of the Earls of Sutherland was built around a medieval keep and grew piecemeal through the 17th and 18th centuries.
The 189-room castle owes its current Renaissance-chateau appearance to a
Victorian remodelling, and the public rooms are the result of a 1919 rebuilding of the ranges following a fire.
The lots sold represented a time capsule of domestic operations “on a Downton Abbey scale”.
Maids’ bedrooms tucked into the eaves of the earlier ranges had been reconfigured to become porcelain stores with rows of footbaths, floral jugs and washbasins, chamber pots, and piles of crested dinner services jostling for space with meat domes, tiered oyster holders and “untold numbers” of copper vessels and glass carafes.
In the Victorian wing, rooms that had served as boys’ dormitories when the castle was a public school in the 1960s had been appropriated for extra storage. One housed stacks of gilt picture frames, another paintings which including Millicent, the duchess’ beloved pet dog.
In the cellars, one room had shelves lined with green baize piled high with silver. There was also a room filled with Scottish arms and armour where the 18th-century pistols that led the sale were found, and a room filled with tartanware.
Most thrilling of all, revealed Bonhams, was the discovery of rooms that even the castle manager had never entered. In one, among the cobwebs, was a row of marble and plaster busts including one of Queen Victoria, who visited in 1872.
Charles Graham-campbell, Bonhams’ managing director in Scotland, added: “With such impeccable and romantic provenance, we had many hundreds of people bidding from all over the world, eager to acquire a piece of history from one of Scotland’s grandest and most historic castles. As we hoped, it proved to be the sale of the season and we are delighted with the result.”
It proved to be the sale of the season and we are delighted with the result