A pair of lions from the funerary monument of Charles V of France was the toast of Christie’s Exceptional sale in London on July 6.
The auction house had hoped the season’s greatest rediscovery could make at least as much as a pair of marble mourners from the tomb of the Duc de Berry (brother of Charles V) at Christie’s Paris last year. They had sold to the Louvre at €4.4m (£3.67m).
Christie’s was not disappointed. The lions bettered their ‘on request’ estimate of around £4m to sell over the phone at £8.2m (plus 25/20/12% buyer’s premium), a record for medieval art at auction.