LONDON.- Sotheby’s announces Treasures: Princely Taste, the sale of an outstanding selection of rare and important decorative art with links to some of the greatest collectors in European history, including Louis XIV, Cardinal Mazarin, King Alfonso XII, Prince Davidoff, the Duc D’Orléans, Giovanni Strozzi and the Duke of Buccleugh. The auction, on Wednesday 6th July 2011 at 6pm, is expected to fetch a total in excess of £9 million. It will comprise 33 lots, encompassing furniture, works of art, clocks, silver and objects of vertu, each displaying the remarkable qualities of princely taste. The sale’s centrepiece is a unique and recently rediscovered masterpiece – an exquisitely carved hardstone cover, the lost partner of a matching cup in the collection of the Louvre