An attic treasure soared to a record price in 15 minutes during intense bidding in a packed sales room in Hudson, New York, on October 26th. The rare Fabergé Imperial figure ultimately sold to a phone bidder for $5.2 million (hammer price; $5,980,000 with fees) against a pre-sale auction estimate of $500,000 to $800,000.  The last of such hardstone figures sold for $1.8 million in 2005, at Sotheby’s, New York.

Nicholas II commissioned Fabergé to produce the portrait figure of N.N.Pustynnikov, the personal Cossack bodyguard (Kamer-Kazak, or Chamber-Cossack) to the Empress Alexandra Feodorovna, and also a second figure, of the Kamer-Kazak to the Dowager Empress Maria Feodorovna, in 1912.

Discovered in an attic by the executor of a Rhinebeck, NY, estate, the figure was purchased at Hammer Galleries, in Manhattan, by Mr. George Davis in December 1934, and had been in the same family ever since. The figure was known to collectors, but the whereabouts was unknown until 2 months ago.

The total number of Fabergé hardstone carvings of human figures produced by Fabergé is probably no more than fifty. They are therefore extremely rare, on a level of rarity with the Imperial Easter Eggs, and the portrait figures, depictions of known historical persons rather than simply "types," are rarer still. Very few portrait figures were produced by Fabergé.

The piece was purchased by Wartski, the famed London based jeweler, who are the jewelers to the Queen of England. They specialize in Russian pieces, most notably Fabergé. It’s not clear if they were purchasing it for stock or a private client. According to the London firm, “the purchase of the figure is a continuation of our long running tradition of acquiring Imperial Russian Works of Art. Wartski were Armand Hammer's prime rivals in the 1920's and 1930's in buying the confiscated Imperial treasures from the Soviet government. We have over the years owned twenty of these rare hardstone figures, as well as a dozen of the legendary Imperial Fabergé Easter Eggs.”