Rare Harry Potter novel sells for eye-watering sum at auction

The auction house said the rare first edition copy was “more elusive than the Golden Snitch”.

An extremely rare first edition of a Harry Potter novel inscribed by JK Rowling has sold for more than £250,000 at auction.

The hardback copy of Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was one of only 500 printed back in 1997.

Of these, auctioneers Sotheby’s said three hundred were handed out to libraries, while two hundred were sent to bookshops.

“A first edition hardback issue is scarce at auction, let alone a copy without the wear and tear that one might expect from a much-loved children's book,” it added.

As a result, the auction house had forecast it would sell for between £100,000 and £150,000. 

However, the book proved more popular than expected, with the winning bid coming in at a staggering £253,999.

‘From you-know-who’

The book features an inscription from JK Rowling, which you can see in the image above.

It reads: “For Deirdre & Gerry, with love & thanks for everything.

She then signs off as “you-know-who. (a.k.a. J.K. Rowling)” – a nod to her Lord Voldemort character.

According to Sotheby’s, Deirdre was a close friend of Rowling's sister, Di, with whom she did her nurse training.

The two became close when the author moved to Edinburgh to be near her sister when she had a young child.

Deirdre, whose surname was not revealed, is the person who put the book up for auction.

‘More elusive than the Golden Snitch’

Sotheby’s explained there were only a “small handful” of pre-publication copies signed by Rowling in existence.

“The copy that Rowling gave to her father and stepmother also contains an inscription dated 11 June 1997, as does the paperback issue inscribed to Rowling's friends Martin and Nicole, so the present copy must contain one of the very earliest inscriptions in existence”, it explained.

“A copy with a pre-publication inscription dating from this early on is more elusive than the Golden Snitch.

Adding to the book’s rarity is the fact it contains certain spelling mistakes.

For example, on the back of the book, it refers to the 'Philospher's Stone', missing the letter ‘o’.

Most expensive Harry Potter sale

Remarkably, the book isn't the most expensive copy of the Philosopher's Stone ever sold.

That title went to another first edition of the same book, which sold for a staggering $471,000 (£353k) at an auction in 2021.

Joe Maddalena from Heritage Auctions, which carried out the sale, said it was "not only is it the most expensive Harry Potter book ever sold, but the most expensive commercially published 20th-century work of fiction ever sold.”