If anyone is interested, there is an auction of the archives of the Pendarves Estate next Tuesday (26th March) in Penzance and online. An awful lot of mining related plans and records are up for sale.

http://www.the-saleroom.com/en-gb/auction-catalogues/david-lay-f-r-i-c-s/catalogue-id-2879759 

Like you say, a lot of intersting stuff, prefer to see it donated to CRO or Redruth Studies.

Lozz.

I have a feeling that the MRO have plans from the Pendarves Estate. I recall seeing some of those before (photos of).

The sett boundaries/maps are interesting, but I can't really see them being of commercial interest to anyone, or anyone wanting to put them on their wall.

I bet there is some gold in there, but I reckon it will probably not be too inspiring price wise. As said before, it's really something which should go to the CRO.

The maps seem to worth more than accounts pages ! maybe worth a few low bids on some stuff...thanks for link

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It is true that westcountry mining/mapping stuff carries a serious premium, but I really think this sort of stuff will not find buyers. People will bid the mine plans up and a few of the more "historically useful" documents will surprise, but a lot of the stuff is so arcane I can't see either the historic value, or the commercial value. It will be interesting to see how it fares.

(I've spent my whole life surrounded by antique dealers and the folks house is full of premium junk)

I would say some of this stuff will go for big prices, but we will find out next week......

If you're looking at mine plans which are not at the CRO, a collection like this would inform your various competing companies doing searches. The sett boundaries are merely pretty maps and don't really inform anyone of anything we didn't know from elsewhere (apart from they are originals). I really can't see how someone is going to say "Here are the accounts from Condurrow from 1809-1811 and sponk hundreds of pounds. Why would you pay so much for something which lists a load of numbers and some writing in an old book?

I suppose you've got investors who are buying an asset to use it for a return and then you've got buyers who are buying for personal reasons, ie:- it's family, they are historians of X-Place.

There was a sale at Triplet park (Rowe's) with bunches of mining books and old 25" maps and it all went off the scale in a major way. I can see how someone (like me) with a load of old maps and a load of old books is heavily prepared to pay a fortune to expand their collection. This stuff doesn't really inform that much. It's pretty much only useful to your TA Morrisons or your Allen Buckleys. Surely.....

I'd be very interested in the reasons of the people who bought it. It's not like gold, come the roma apocalypse.

Some of this stuff will fetch a tidy price and there will be a lot of throat cutting for some of the items.
The copper tickets (lot 38) are something of a rarity, the Wheal Music (Navvy Pit) map is interesting too (lot 62), also of interest is the lease to search for minerals at Killivose. Possibly Wh. Nancy?.

IMHO the documents should have been scanned and copies sent to County Records for archiving with access to them say a year after the auction has finished.
If I had been working at Lays I'd have stayed on overnight to do it. Gratis 🙂

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It never ceases to amaze me what things go for at auctions. The thing is with these documents is they are unique - if two people with access to a lot of cash want them, they will go very big.