Swedish flea-market Buddha bought for SEK 20 sells for SEK 2.44M after 40 years

A tiny Buddha statue bought for just over SEK 20 at a Swedish flea market in the 1980s has turned into a multimillion-kronor discovery after experts identified it as a rare work from China’s Ming dynasty. The gilt-bronze statue of Shakyamuni Buddha, which had spent decades in a private Swedish home, fetched a final price of SEK 2,437,500 at Stockholms Auktionsverk’s Asian Fine Art Sale on December 11, 2025. The amount is more than 120,000 times the original purchase price of just over SEK 20.The sculpture was bought at a flea market in Uppsala by the eventual seller, who purchased it for its appearance without initially knowing its historical or artistic significance. According to Stockholms Auktionsverk, the statue remained largely unnoticed in the private home for decades before its importance was recognised.The auction house identified the piece as a rare Buddha figure from the Yongle period, which lasted from 1403 to 1424 during the Ming dynasty. The period is associated with some of the finest examples of early Ming Buddhist sculpture.From flea-market find to Ming-era artworkThe statue stands just over 18 centimetres tall and is cast in gilt bronze. It depicts Shakyamuni Buddh...