When the French literature section of the great Bradley Martin library was sold in 1989 (at Sotheby’s Monaco), an 1845 first of La Reine Margot by Alexandre Dumas père was offered as part of a job lot of three of his works that sold for FFr11,500 (£1100).
Bound as six octavo volumes in half red morocco gilt (right), it was offered again last month in a September 14 sale of the Vandaele library held by Tajan of Paris.
There it was described as a rare and sought-after work – written in collaboration with Auguste Maquet, as were a number of Dumas’ novels – and one that is defined in FW Reed’s 1933 bibliography of the author as the first of Dumas’ three great Valois romances.