News | January 30, 2025

Johannes Kepler’s Mysterium cosmographicum Sold for World Record for $327,600

Christie's

The Astronomia nova

Leading the auction results at Christie’s' latest Fine Printed Books and Manuscripts sale was Johannes Kepler’s Astronomia nova which went for $327,600.

It was among various scientific works from the Owen Gingerich Astronomical Library. Other items from the Gingerich library included Kepler’s Mysterium cosmographicum which set a new world record at $277,200, the Stellarum Fixarum Catologus Britannicus of John Flamsteed ($176,400), and Nicolaus Copernicus’s De revolutionibus orbium coelestium which made $163,800. From the section of the auction featuring Incunabula from the Collection of Eugene S. Flamm, Pliny the Elder’s Historia naturalis, in Italian, sold for $201,600. 

Other highlights included the 1922 Annette Campbell-White copy of James Joyce’s Ulysses, signed by Joyce ($138,600) and Marlon Brando’s annotated partial script for The Godfather ($30,240).

Interestingly, just under a quarter of bidders and buyers at the auction were new to book sales at Christie’s.