Trotter wrote:

Mr. Underhill wrote:

The signature in the photo accompanying the pipe that is marked 1959 is a fake signature straight up...and not a very good one at that.

The Guide to Tolkien's Letters gives us a great guide to Tolkien signatures, as well as being a great research tool.

Letter from J.R.R. Tolkien to Dr. Zettersten • 19 May 1959 (#344)

Yes, as Trotter points out, working on the Letters Guide has given us a lot of practice looking at and reading Tolkien's handwriting as well as looking at his signature. You can see these two above, supposed to be done at the same time. One is real and one is not.

I have read the various comments with great care and, while I agree with some of the observations, I am currently unable to give a definitive judgment on certain items in the auction that have been brought to attention here.

About four years ago, I contacted a priest (R.A.) for information about some books that had belonged to John F. R. Tolkien, and he also mentioned a Missal. Could it be the Missal that I now see in the auction as Lot 43? Interesting that the books I had asked for information about were then sold at auction on 28 September 2023.

I have written to Auctioneum to request further details regarding the provenance of the items, because there is something that leaves me puzzled. I am awaiting a reply from the auction house and hope to receive the necessary information.

Perhaps the Auction House holds a document proving the true provenance, confirming the wording found beneath the various lots: “Gifted by Tolkien to his son John Francis Tolkien and subsequently to the present owner.” Who knows — it may turn out that the current owner did in fact receive the items directly from Father Francis, and that their authenticity is thereby confirmed, or else that forgeries are being sold. I am not yet fully convinced, and if anyone feels as I do and wishes, I can update them when I receive a reply to my enquiry.

Provenance is only as good as the chain of documentation supporting the claims and the probability of that documentation being accurate and at least partially verifiable. The auction house here doesn’t disclose which collections the items even came from. The expectation is ‘trust me, bro’.

I’d want some pretty solid evidence that something like that ‘self portrait’ was real. Literally anyone could have drawn that at any time. Other than I am being told it is real, what reason do I have to take that claim at face value?

Dodgy stuff gets sold with believable stories all the time. People willingly accept the stories for a variety of reasons.

Will be interesting to see where this goes. I feel like the auction house needs to ‘show their work’ here.

Totally agree with that.
For instance, I think it's really unbelievable that the '63 deluxe set slipcase has not been described as not being the original. (Either a facsimile, or a cardboard around which the original slipcase paper has been cut and glued).

Emilien wrote:

Totally agree with that.
For instance, I think it's really unbelievable that the auction house hasn't described the '63 deluxe set slipcase as not being the original. (Either a facsimile, or a cardboard around which the original slipcase paper has been cut and glued).

For me, that's an easily provable 'canary in the coal-mine' item, where the auction house hasn't got even simple description and verification correct for an item that should be uncontentious. Makes me wonder what hope there is for the other items that would need considerable investigation. Of course, mistakes do happen.

I hope the Auction House cancels this auction and improves training on Tolkien items for staff.

If they do so, I expect we will see the items for sale on eBay 🤦

This is bad.

Aelfwine wrote:

This is bad.

At this point the only thing I am surprised by is that the person selling this stuff does not have the actual ring that inspired Tolkien 🤦

Perhaps the Auction House holds a document proving the true provenance, confirming the wording found beneath the various lots: “Gifted by Tolkien to his son John Francis Tolkien and subsequently to the present owner.”

Who knows,for it may turn out that the current owner did in fact receive the items directly,or worse indirectly, from Father Francis, and that their authenticity is thereby confirmed, or else that forgeries are being sold. Well, the Auction holding such a document would certainly help matters somewhat but not yet confirmation of authenticity. What if,for many things change over time,the document is the only authentic item left after,say a house fire. What if,some of the items are authentic and the others fake. what if,the document is faked along with the rest. I could go on but just to add that nothing is ever 100%,not even in the rose-tinted past.

For me,even if some of the inscribed or personal items are genuine,the experience has become so contaminated by falsehood and deception, not yet worthy of the hand of Sauron,which does not auger well for any provenance trails resulting from this auction. Yet I suppose some morbid interest it has for I'm writing about it here and some of the books are indeed nice items (proviso,I've yet to see more photos and items in the flesh) which I suspect are from a a good or true collection intermixed with cherry picked false items and suspect devices that will later blow up in the unsuspecting new owner(s) faces,if unduly sold.Not for me on any level.

Tolkieniano wrote:

Perhaps the Auction House holds a document proving the true provenance, confirming the wording found beneath the various lots: “Gifted by Tolkien to his son John Francis Tolkien and subsequently to the present owner.” Who knows

Doubtful, otherwise they would have produced it in the first place. I think there is a reason these items did not go to a more reputable auction house like Sotheby's or Christie's. A one sentence blurb about where the items came from is not provenance and anyone who collects should know this. You can't just take someone's word on something, especially at the price levels these items are being offered for.

Take the pipe for example, true provenance would be an authenticated photo of Tolkien using the pipe, or gift receipt or something similar. The auction house has produced nothing like this for any of the items.

There has been an explosion in the market for Tolkien collecting in the last decade, particularly in the last five years. Scammers have noticed and are willing to take chances on more forgeries because there are so many new to the market with money they are willing to spend. Because of this any items without iron clad provenance (which none of these items that supposedly belonged to Tolkien do) their authenticity has to be doubted.