blank auctionA rare 237-year-old copy of the US Constitution has been sold at auction for a whopping $9 million (£7 million).
The document was discovered in 2022 in a dusty old filing cabinet at a historic building in North Carolina.
This copy was printed in 1787 after representatives from the colonial states met at the Constitutional Convention and drafted what would become the founding document of the U.S. federal government.
Only eight such copies are believed to exist, seven of which are in public ownership.
The identity of the buyer, who made a bid by phone, has not been disclosed.
Bids were placed in increments of $50,000, and Thursday’s closing took just seven minutes.
The Constitution was discovered two years ago on a historic plantation once owned by Samuel Johnston, who was Governor of North Carolina at the time the document was written.
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This document was discovered in a file cabinet in 2022.
In 1983, a copy of the Declaration of Independence found on the same property sold for $412,500, but a copy of the Constitution was somehow not discovered until 2022.
The draft Constitution was accompanied by a letter signed by George Washington, who later became the first president of the United States, urging the states to ratify the document.
“In order to provide benefit and security to all while ensuring to each person all the rights of independent sovereignty, individuals entering society must give up some of their freedoms in order to preserve the rest. ” Washington wrote.
The last time such a U.S. Constitution went under the gavel was in 1891, when it sold for $400.
The auction was held in Asheville but was postponed last month after Hurricane Helen caused widespread damage in the area.
