Hi Ben,

Thank you for contacting Mearto with your appraisal inquiry.

Jesse Ramsden is remembered as one of the most important makers of scientific instruments of the 18th century. While collectors prize his barometers, his greatest reputation rests on the extraordinary precision of his astronomical, surveying, and optical instruments, which revolutionized science and navigation.

Born in Yorkshire in 1735, Ramsden apprenticed to a mathematical instrument maker in London before opening his own workshop in 1762. His business at 199 Piccadilly eventually employed around fifty craftsmen and became one of Europe's leading instrument-making establishments.

He married Sarah Dollond, daughter of the famous optician John Dollond, linking two of England's most celebrated instrument-making families.

Ramsden developed highly accurate dividing engines, machines capable of engraving scales on scientific instruments with unprecedented precision. This innovation dramatically improved the accuracy of sextants, theodolites, astronomical circles, barometers and surveying equipment.

Although best known for astronomical instruments, Ramsden also produced some of the finest English mercury barometers of the Georgian period.

Mega NY and London auction house Christie's website notes that A signed "J. Ramsden, London" barometer is considered substantially more desirable than a comparable unsigned Georgian example, owing to Ramsden's international reputation and the prestige associated with his workshop.

Christie's sold a virtually identical Ramsden barometer with the mercury removed for £5,400 against an estimate of £3,000-5,000 in July 2007 (https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-4941639) ; generally speaking, they have not achieved such high prices for exceptional barometers since 2018.

With changing restrictions and regulations surrounding shipping and transporting barometers (both antique and modern) with mercury, the market for antique barometers has slipped a bit. Most auction houses will still sell them but there may be restrictions in your state about purchasing them or having them shipped into, out of or within and, accordingly, most auction houses price barometers they are selling quite conservatively, rarely above $1,000.

If you're interested in selling this or any of the other barometers you've asked us to appraise, you might reach out to British born barometer dealer John Forster, who owns Barometer Fair in Sarasota, Florida. He buys and sells all barometer varieties (stick, wheel, banjo and aneroid) and is well-known in the antiques business for paying fair prices (and you'd avoid paying an auctioneer a commission to sell them). Other US-based barometer dealers include The Barometer Shop (Rockport, Maine) and The Weather Store (Sandwich, Mass).

Based on the photos and information provided, and subject to examination, this is:

An antique George III mahogany bowfront stick barometer
Jesse Ramsden, London, late 18th Century
with swan-neck pediment centered by a brass vase finial and urn-shaped cistern cover and fluted and canted corner cistern base, turned ivory key, bowed glass to engraved brass register plate, signed 'Ramsden/London'
39 inches overall length
CONDITION: this appears to be in good cosmetic condition; not examined or warranted to be in working condition
PROVENANCE: Inherited
$ 800-1,200*
*represents a fair-market value for auction purposes; retail or asking price may vary.

Please let us know if you have additional items to appraise, or questions/concerns, and thank you again for using Mearto.
~ Delia