Doria Atlas

[2] It also contains rare Italian maps dating back to the 1620s, in addition to a series of manuscript maps produced by little-known publishers during the 1620s and 1630s and detailing the commercial, political and military interests of the Doria family.

[citation needed] Having passed through successive generations of the Doria family, and later the British Rail Pension Fund, it was bought at auction by rare book collector Christopher Pease, 2nd Baron Wardington, for £240,000 in September 1988.

In April 2004, the Doria Atlas was saved from a fire at Wardington Manor in Oxfordshire, when approximately 50 local residents "formed a human chain" to remove items from the Wardington library while firefighters were still attempting to put out the fire.

[3] Repair costs, in addition to Wardington's advanced age and frailty, forced a sale of 700 items from the collection.

Its sale price was the highest ever for an atlas, a record surpassed by the Geographia the following year.