A first printing of the U.S. Constitution sold for $43.2 million Thursday night at a Sotheby’s auction, setting a record for a historic document.
Sotheby’s didn’t disclose a winner of the auction, which garnered attention after a group of crypto investors under the name of ConstitutionDAO said they raised more than $40 million to purchase the document. In a tweet Thursday, the group said they lost their bid.
The artifact carried a presale estimate of $15 million to $20 million and belonged to collector Dorothy Goldman. Her late husband, S. Howard Goldman, had purchased it for $165,000 in 1988.
The piece is one of 13 surviving copies of the Official Edition of the Constitution printed in 1787 for the delegates to the Constitutional Convention and for the Continental Congress.
ConstitutionDAO said Thursday that it had 17,437 donors, with a median donation size of $206.26. Participants donated Ethereum through Juicebox.money, a platform for community-owned Ethereum-based projects.
“While this wasn’t the outcome we hoped for, we still made history tonight,” the group said in a statement posted on Twitter. “This is the largest crowdfund for a physical object that we are aware of — crypto or fiat.”
— With assistance by James Tarmy
