Richard Brockway has been collecting antiquities and artifacts for 50 years accumulating vast knowledge of the field. We also use experts in particular areas of ancient art to authenticate. Oftentimes we will test with thermoluminescence if we think it’s necessary. Most importantly, we guarantee unequivocally every piece that we sell and document this with a Certificate of Authenticity which is a lifetime guarantee, not just 30-60 days as some dealers do. In all our years of dealing, we’ve never had a piece come back.

Richard started Ancient Art International in 1988, but has been studying and collecting since 1960.

The field was formerly underappreciated. There used to be much more available as the Europeans gathered objects for two hundred plus years. Since UNESCO passed the Cultural Property Laws, it’s now illegal to take pieces out of the country of origin. The supply has dried up and as people have become educated about the rarity and beauty of ancient pieces, the prices have begun to rise appreciably. Chinese Artifacts- Antiquities poured out during the Cultural Revolution (1966-76). With the economic expansion, large quantities of Chinese antiquities entered the international art market and prices of Chinese pieces dropped. But as illegal excavation was curtailed and the Army’s efforts to gain foreign currency for the government were controlled, scarcity and therefore increases in pricing began to mount. Now it is a capital offense to take an antiquity out of China. In addition, the prosperity in China has allowed the emergence of a collecting class. The Chinese are now frequenting world auctions in order to repatriate their antiquity treasures.

Upon confirmation of your payment with PayPal or credit card, email us with your desired delivery service and urgency. We will arrange the safest and swiftest form. We will invoice you for our corporate reduced rate shipping. FYI, we have found that some carriers will not deliver to a particular country.

Richard has been collecting for 50 years. He lived abroad in many places. He lived in England when ancient art was abundant because the British mariners brought home souvenirs of their travels. He lived in Japan, Italy and then Turkey in the mid-sixties; antiquities were abundant and legal to export. After UNESCO passed the Cultural Properties law, it was no longer possible to export from Turkey so a huge source of genuine antiquities dried up. In ten years in Paris, Brockway developed numerous contacts in the antiquities field and is on a first name basis with almost everybody in the business. Many times he has first examination of inherited collections that come on the market. With fifty years of collecting, we are sitting on a huge inventory. All was acquired legally and at prices considerably under today’s market which allows the savings to be passed on to our customers.

PayPal, Visa and MasterCard

BCE is "Before Common Era" and CE is "Common Era" - we use these designations for our dating of pieces.