Detail: Embracing 5000 years of Asian art history, this season’s ‘Asian Art / 5000 Years’ sale features a wide variety of ceramics, sculptures and jade spanning the length and breadth of Asia. A notable highlight of the sale is a number of Chinese artefacts from the estate of Father Émile Ducarme (杜嘉猷) including an exceptionally rare illuminated Ming dynasty manuscript, the Beidoujing 北斗經, commissioned by the wife of the Jiajing Emperor in 1542; two ink rubbings with extracts from the ‘Qianlong Stone Classics’ stele; and a number of personal effects including scholar artefacts and jades.

Born in Raismes on 2 April 1884, Ducarme was among a small group of seminary students sent to China in 1903. Ordained in Jiaxing in April 1905, Father Ducarme went on to serve as the first priest of Changxindian, the director of the entire Nantang district of Beijing and, finally, as curé of the Église Saint-Michel which stands to this day in the former French Legation.