Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

[Norse_Angel]

Hail!
I was going through my collections of books, and thought I might as well share some from my collection with the forum. Feel free to do the same yourself.

First on my list, and my most prized possession, is an original copy of Frithiofs Saga. This was found while working at a Thrift Store, someone didn't know what they had when they donated a box of books. The cover is real leather, with Gold Leaf embossment, truly spectacular for the time period.

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Next from my collection, before I let others post their own, is a limited 1/100 of "The Necromantic Ritual Book" By Leilah Wendell. The whole book is hand made, no two copies are the same. This was a gift from my friend after we stopped with our Necromantic Practices. He didn't want it anymore.

[Munin-Hugin]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

For about five years, I had worked for Goodwill Industries, an international non-profit group, as a manager of one of their retail locations. On any given day, we would get in all sorts of various things, from junk to gems and trash to treasures. Unfortunately, we were unable to purchase the things we took in during our shifts, so I was unable to get my hands on one of the most unique finds that I had come across.

In a box of junk I found a leather bound book, quite large and obviously very old. The pages were gilded, and very fragile, and everything was written in German, with a flowing typesetting that reminded me of the Gothic font. It turned out to be a Lutheran Bible from the mid-1700's. The binding was hand done with twine, and all in all it was a beautiful tome. After an argument with one of my other managers over whether we should sell it and for how much, I slapped a price tag on it and put it up in our display case, much to the extreme doubt of my assistant manager. Three days later, it sold for $800.

[Norse_Angel]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

For about five years, I had worked for Goodwill Industries, an international non-profit group, as a manager of one of their retail locations. On any given day, we would get in all sorts of various things, from junk to gems and trash to treasures. Unfortunately, we were unable to purchase the things we took in during our shifts, so I was unable to get my hands on one of the most unique finds that I had come across.

In a box of junk I found a leather bound book, quite large and obviously very old. The pages were gilded, and very fragile, and everything was written in German, with a flowing typesetting that reminded me of the Gothic font. It turned out to be a Lutheran Bible from the mid-1700's. The binding was hand done with twine, and all in all it was a beautiful tome. After an argument with one of my other managers over whether we should sell it and for how much, I slapped a price tag on it and put it up in our display case, much to the extreme doubt of my assistant manager. Three days later, it sold for $800.

Oh my, I do apologize for your loss. Meanwhile, I wasn't working at the thrift store, I was volunteering for court reasons. Our manager wasn't the brightest, so I went up to him and showed him the book, told him it was too tarnished to sell, that it would fray in the box, and no one would want it. He told me I could take it home.
After going to three appraisers in Chicago, I found out a similar copy sold in auction for around $4000. One of the shops offered me $2k for it, which I respectfully declined.
To my knowledge, old bibles are extremely collectible, and can go upwards of a couple hundred thousand. The highest price a bible ever sold for was a 1456 Gutenberg Bible which sold for 4.9 million in auction.
Heres a link for you of appraised bibles if you're of interest.

http://www.greatsite.com/ancient-rare-bibles-books/platinum.html

[DanieMarie]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

Being in Germany, I have several older books. I don't think any of them are particularly valuable (not all old books are valuable), but I find them interesting. I have a number of Insel books (a publisher of cheap editions of mostly public domain works...it still exists) from 100 years ago. They belonged to my great grandfather and were brought from Germany to Canada and then back to Germany again. We also have a book on herbs and their medicinal purposes that my mother in law gave us. It's from the 1930s, but has interesting drawings.

Our family bible is REALLY old. That's in Canada because my mom has it, but maybe it will be passed onto me. We're not Christian, but people in Germany used to record all the births, marriages, and deaths in the family in their family bibles. So, it has a lot of our family history in there.

Between my boyfriend and I, we have a lot of books from former East Germany, including a set of really biased encyclopedias and a school atlas. Those aren't really worth a lot at the moment, but I think they will be someday. Not that many were printed, people didn't hold onto them after reunification, and they're historically interesting. Some of the other books also feature really stunning artwork. I have a lovely copy of Faust in pristine condition that has excellent illustrations.

I'll take some pics later on my phone!


EDIT: There are two books I used to have that I'm really kicking myself for not keeping. One had no value really, but all its owners had written their names, places, and dates in the front cover. That book had somehow made it all over the world over 40 or so years! I guess I let it stay on its journey, though. Maybe I hadn't a right to keep a thing like that. The other was a block printed book of legends from Burma, printed when it was still called Burma. I found it in a thrift store. I gave it away and I highly doubt the person I gave it to appreciated it.

[volcaniclastic]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

I've got a bunch of old books, but I'm not sure I'd call them valuable. I have a decrepit version of The Last Days of Pompeii, Madame de Pompadour, A Christmas Carol, Love Letters to Lord Byron, etc. My absolute favourite though (by this I mean, in a house fire, I'm grabbing my cat, dog, passport, and this book) is The Glamour of British Columbia. It's everything I love about life (and my homeland) rolled into one memoir written by one of the first women to travel alone through the wilderness in the early 20th century. Every passage in there is beautiful.

[Willow]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

This thread is interesting. I no longer own any valuable books (though I did have a few pricy books simply because they were pretty obscurely regional in focus and hard to find. They've since been sold to clear clutter for my upcoming move.

Anyway, I work handling some of these more collectible books and it's always neat to see them come through. We had a couple first edition Crowley books come through at one point, but they were so badly damaged they didn't actually go for as much as you might think.

[Norse_Angel]

Re: Book Collectors of The Rare and Prized.

Here is my copy of the Brothers Grimm. It's a piece from the international collectors library, the guild is absolutely beautiful, apparently all hand done. They value at a couple hundred in good condition, but still steadily becoming more and more saught after. Mine is priceless to me.

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And then here's my copy of Adam Bede, also from the ICL. The binding itself is a replication of 19th century Mercier Binding. Same with the Brothers Grimm, it's valued at a couple hundred.