Automaton sells for £10k

A RARE 130-year-old mechanical automaton has fetched almost £10,000 at auction.

The working automaton of a black man smoking a cigarette was made by famous Frenchman Gustave Vichy between 1860 and 1910 in Paris.

It was sold at Lyon and Turnbull’s Edinburgh saleroom to an anonymous online bidder who paid £9125.

The sum is more than nine times the £1000 pre-sale estimate for the collectible.