Picturing the Auction Room features a selection of materials associated with the rare book and manuscript trade in late nineteenth- and early-twentieth century Britain.

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In addition to representations of historical auction rooms, this online exhibition displays a selection  of auction ephemera and archival documents, including annotated catalogues and newspapers, as well as images of medieval manuscripts, book dealers and collectors, all of which offer important insights into the processes behind the trade of medieval manuscripts in the period.

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These materials are central sources for the research conducted by the CULTIVATE MSS team (Institute of English Studies, SAS, University of London), who through them investigates the place of medieval manuscripts in early twentieth-century culture and how the trade in these objects shaped modern ideas about the Middle Ages.

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This exhibition was created as part of a series of public engagement outputs developed for the Being Human Festival - A Festival of the Humanities 2021, with the aims of starting new conversations about the importance of historical auctions as a moment in which cultural heritage gained new value and meaning. This research has been undertaken as part of the CULTIVATE MSS project, which has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme (Grant agreement No. 817988).