Montgolfier-style' Balloon Globe

Being offered for sale in our 25 January 2017 auction

A scarce 'Montgolfier-style' hot air balloon globe. A heat source placed beneath the globe would have inflated the paper allowing the globe to rise. Alternatively the balloon could be inflated with a pump. Fully inflated to its twelve foot circumference the globe would have resembled a large Chinese lantern. Printed beneath the patent on the globe is the legend: 'Sets of gores with outlines for the formation of globes with corresponding atlas-skeleton hemispheres, and the four quarters, geographical states; Air pumps for the inflation of globes &c. may be had of the author'. In view of its flimsy construction very few of these globes have survived. Estimate: £400-600