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Morton auction house returned the Meritorious Autonomous University of Puebla (BUAP) a letter from 1813 signed by José María Morelos y Pavón and addressed to Captain Gral. Ygnacio Rayón that was identified by Mexican researchers as Historical University Heritage.
Morton informed on September 18, in its Mexico City headquarters, that it delivered the historical paper after BUAP researchers were able to identify it in one of the catalogs published by the auction house in July.
The letter was part of lot 125 and was expected to be sold for up to MXN $100,000, nevertheless, BUAP researchers showed evidence that confirmed the manuscript had gone missing in 1996 from the archive that belongs to the Historical University Heritage.
Moreover, the experts added that it belonged to the epistolary corpus that was consulted and transcripted at the José María Lafragua Library in 1907.
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“The management of the return of the letter to its place of origin was achieved with the mediation of Morton Subastas and in full agreement with the collector and consignor that had it,” said Morton in a statement.
The auction house said the document had been found and recovered by its owners; nonetheless, it regretted that most archives “do not have detailed inventories of their collections so it is practically impossible to show their theft and loss.”
The document was received by Rosalva Loreto López, head of the BUAP’s University Historical Heritage, and Mercedes Salomón Salazar, head of the José María Lafragua Library, with the presence of Luis López Morton, president and founder of Morton Subastas, and Jaime Gutiérrez de la Peza, the legal representative of Isaac Backal, holder of the document , “who bona fide purchased it from an individual more than 20 years ago without knowing its origin and who took care of it during this time.”
The local auction house also said, “it does not acquire the lots it offers in public request for bids, it is just a mediator between private citizens, ensuring the visibility and transparency of the purchase and sales transactions.”
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