1916 declarations sell for £56,000

One and a half copies of the declaration of the Irish Republic, printed in 1916, have been sold to a New York collector for £56,000.

One of a handful of complete surviving copies fetched a record £52,000 at the sale in Dublin yesterday. A partially-completed version of the declaration, printed as a souvenir by the victors in the aftermath of the Easter Rising, sold for £4,000.

Ian Whyte, of Whyte's auctioneers, described the original copy as "probably the most important pieces of paper documentation in the 20th century in Ireland".