Location: London
Year Discovered: 1970s
Est. Value: Unknown
Only 20 copies of Anthony van Dyck’s picture of Infanta Isabella C. Eugenia, the powerful ruler of Brussels in the 17th century, were known to exist until Chris Wright stumbled into a nearby London antique shop and discovered a seemingly good copy of the original.
Despite knowing about 17th-century art history, he chose to purchase it for $88, not giving it any further thought.
The “copy” may have actually been an original, maybe from van Dyck’s own workshop, specialists at the Courtauld Institute of Art in London “tentatively proposed” almost 50 years later.