J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings writing desk is going up for auction in London

A piece of literary history is going up for auction this month in London: J.R.R. Tolkien’s very own writing desk.

This piece of Lord of the Rings mega-merch is expected to sell for between £50,000 and £80,000 when it is auctioned on December 11th.

The desk was owned by Tolkien during his years as professor of English at Merton College, part of the University of Oxford.

It was used by the legendary author in the mid-1950s, and is known to have been in situ right around the time the last volume of The Lord of the Rings was published.

Where the One Ring was forged

Christie’s reckons Tolkien would have made revisions to later drafts of his epic while sat at this very desk.

“The Merton desk thus occupies a pivotal position in Tolkien’s career as the site of his final touches to his masterwork: it connects the imaginative world of the early drafts with the formal apparatus of publication,” says Christie’s.

The desk remained in Tolkien’s possession after his days at Merton — he retired in 1959 — and made its way to his home in Oxford, where he worked on later publications like the poetry collection The Adventures of Tom Bombadil.

Tolkien flogged the thing to a notable author in her own right, Dame Iris Murdoch, in 1968 when Tolkien moved to Bournemouth.

“This piece constitutes one of the most important artefacts of Tolkien’s career and is the only desk belonging to Tolkien still in private hands,” says Christie’s Thais Hitchins.

The lot is part of the Groundbreakers: Icons of our Time auction, which kicks off at 4pm on December 11th. It is stacked with historical items of note.

The most valuable of the lot include an Oviraptorosaur skeleton, with a £5 million upper estimate, the Batpod from The Dark Knight (£500,000) and original Harry the Hammer cover artwork for the original edition of Warhammer (£400,000) by John Blanche.

It's a collection well worth rifling through. And if you are actually interested in bidding, Christie’s is holding viewing sessions from December 6th up to the auction itself on December 11th, at 8 King Street, St. James’s in London.

• Rare London Tube map expected to sell for up to £100,000 at auction

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