A rare first edition of John James Audubon’s illustrated “The Birds of America” laid a golden egg Friday, selling for $7.9 million.
Christie’s auction house in Manhattan identified the buyer only as an American collector who bid by phone.
The winning price was within the presale estimate of $7 million to $10 million for the work, which depicts more than 400 life-size North American species in four monumental volumes and is considered a masterpiece of ornithology art.
Another complete first edition of “The Birds of America” sold at Sotheby’s in London in December 2010 for $11.5 million, a record for the most expensive printed book sold at auction.
