The extremely rare first-edition printed copy of the U.S Constitution sold for US$43.2 million in New York on Thursday. The sale became the most expensive historical document ever to sell at auction. It also surpassed the previous auction record for a book, manuscript, or printed text, Sotheby’s said.
The document is one out of eleven surviving copies of the U.S Constitution and the last in private hands since the first printing of the final text. It was produced for delegates of the 1787 Constitutional Convention and Continental Congress. The U.S. The Constitution was drafted during secret meetings in Philadelphia and laid the foundation for American democracy and guaranteed citizens’ basic rights.
According to Sotheby’s the Constitution Convention’s official printers created 500 copies of a final “official edition” and passed them to delegates. The auction house said two parties were in a “nearly 8-minute bidding battle.” One of the parties was a cryptocurrency investor group called Constitution DAO.
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