Collection 'Duke of Meppen'

The button collection of the Duke of Meppen, well known by button collectors, interests me deeply because it’s an original Belgian collection. During the first part of the 19th C, Mr. Bousse gathered together thousands of the finest 18th an 19th C butttons. This exquisite collection was sold at an auction in Gand, in 1850, and bought by the Duke d’Arenberg, also Duke of Meppen. A part of this collection re-appeared after more than 100 years at an auction by Sotheby’s in London. It was divided in more than 150 lots of ca 20 buttons. A large part of the buttons were bought by American collectors and the last 60 years, the buttons were dispersed all over the world.

It is one of my dreams to reconstruct this wonderful collection. I recently found the proof that the Duke of Meppen possessed a button collection of more than 8000 pieces in 1905. Based on the catalog of the Sotheby’s auction in 1961, I found already few of the buttons on auctions in Amerika and France. If you have information of any kind concerning this collection, please, let me know.