CONSIDERED OPINION

VIVIAN WINEMAN

Recently, I visited Sotheby’s to see an exhibition with a difference.

In Sotheby’s luxurious galleries, there were the usual impressive works of art, scheduled for future sale, from artists as varied as Kandinsky and Munch to Lucien Freud and Anish Kapoor. Among this glittering array, tucked away in one of the smaller galleries there was a single volume – the Codex Sassoon – the oldest and most complete Hebrew version of the bible in existence.

It is intended to be sold later in the year by auction in New York. The guide price is US$50 million which, if achieved, will be the highest price ever paid for a written document in any language. It would pip Leonardo da Vinci’s notebook, the Codex Leicester, which was bought by Bill Gates for US$30.8million and the copy of the US Constitution bought by Citadel founder Ken Griffin for US$43.2 million.

If you were narrating the history of the Jewish people in 100 objects, this artifact would come close to the top of the list. It is named after its most notable private owner, David Salman Sassoon, who acquired it for the princely sum of £350 in 1929. Carbon testing of the document, along with calligraphic and other examinations, all point to a date