The Rothschild Faberge egg was made in 1902 is just one of 12 in public hands known to have been produced to standards required by the Russian Imperial family. Auction house Christie’s said the piece, which features a diamond-set cockerel which pops up, flaps its wings, nods its head and crows every hour, was sold to a private Russian buyer for £8.9 million after just 10 minutes of bidding.

The sale of the translucent pink egg topped with a diamond-studded cockerel was a record for a Faberge work of art. Christie’s also confirmed it also broke the record price paid for any for Russian artwork, excluding paintings. The previous highest price was the $9.6 million paid for a Faberge Winter Egg in New York in April 2002.

Faberge eggs have become a byword for opulence and luxury ever since the young jeweler was commissioned in 1885 by Tsar Alexander III of Russia to make one as a gift for his wife Maria. The record-breaking egg was originally acquired by Maurice Ephrussi, who represented the Rothschild family's oil interests in Baku, Azerbaijan.

Record-breaking auction opulence

The Rothchild Egg is not the only rare and expensive item to hit the headlines. Truffle hunter Cristiano Savini stands to generate over £100,000 when a 1.5kg white truffle he unearthed in the Italian countryside goes under the hammer at a charity auction in Macau.

Savini's dog, Rocco, sniffed out the truffle, one of the biggest unearthed in the past 50 years, by an oak tree near Pisa last weekend, in an area of Tuscany where Cristiano and his father scout for truffles every year. Ten years ago, they found a half-kilo white truffle by the same tree. According to media reports, Savini’s find was the biggest of its kind found since a 2.5kg truffle was discovered in 1954 and presented to former US President Dwight Eisenhower.