Rare first edition Robert Burns poetry book sells for more than £60,000 at auction

dailyrecord.co.uk:

A rare first edition of Robert Burns' poetry has fetched over £60,000 at an auction, exceeding expectations.Lyon & Turnbull announced on Thursday that the coveted Poems Chiefly In The Scottish Dialect was purchased for a sum of £62,700, buyer's premium included.

The book, one of only 88 known surviving copies, was initially projected to sell for between £50,000 and £60,000.This sale marks a significant leap from the book's original price point; upon release, all 612 copies were snapped up for three shillings each and sold out within just a month.

Burns began his poetic journey at 15 and was 27 when this seminal work was published. Join the Daily Record's WhatsApp community here and get the latest news sent straight to your messages. The Kilmarnock edition is home to some of Burns' most celebrated poems, many of which he penned at Mossgiel farm in Mauchline, East Ayrshire, where he lived and farmed with his brother Gilbert from 1784 to 1788.Classics such as To A Mouse, Address To The Deil, The Twa Dogs, and Halloween are among his earliest compositions.Cathy Marsden, who leads the books and manuscripts department at Lyon & Turnbull, had previously expressed her excitement: "It is extremely exciting to come across one of the first edition copies of the single most famous volume in Scottish cultural heritage."She added: "From humble Ayrshire origins, Burns was to become an international literary star.

Although very confident in his own abilities, even he could not have predicted such success."Despite Burns's farming efforts not equating to his poetic success the farm was in financial decline it was during his time at Mossgiel that he encountered a group of six lasses, inspiring his poem The Belles Of Mauchline.A