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A rare first edition of Lawrence of Arabia's autobiography that has been in the same family for nearly a century has sold for over £40,000.

Only 170 first edition copies of The Seven Pillars of Wisdom were ever published by the war hero in 1927.

Winston Churchill ranked it 'with the greatest books ever written in the English language.'

This copy was given to a member of the immensely wealthy diamond mining Oppenheimer family.