July 2015 | Rebecca Rego Barry

Illuminated Medical Manuscript at Auction

Dreweatts.jpgA star lot at Bloomsbury Auctions' sale in London this week is the McKell Medical Almanack, an illuminated manuscript on parchment that offers medical-astronomical prognostications for the calendar year (it was commissioned in 1445). What makes it special, aside from its beauty, is that the "long-lost" manuscript was last recorded and seen about sixty years ago, according to the auctioneer. It had been owned by Col. David McCandless McKell (1881-1962) of Cillicothe, Ohio, and was exhibited at the University of Kentucky library in March 1958, but it has been untraceable since. Scholars have been getting by with a black-and-white reproduction.

The estimate is £60,000-80,000 ($93,700-125,000). 

Image via Bloomsbury Auctions.