Dozen eggs for sale: asking price, $90m. Now Forbes family sells off its Fabergés

It is a classic case of selling off the family silver. Except that this is no ordinary family and the silver - plus the gold and diamonds - is among the most highly prized in the world.

Perhaps only the Royal Family disposing of the Crown Jewels could compare to the Forbes family selling off its collection of Fabergé jewellery.

It is a collection that includes nine of the Fabergé Imperial Easter Eggs, the largest collection of the fabled jewel-encrusted eggs made for the Russian Tsars still held in private hands.

The auction at Sotheby's in April is expected to raise $90m (£49m) for the Forbes coffers, which were built on the eponymous financial magazine famous for its annual list of the world's richest people.

But times have changed even for a family so synonymous with money. It is only the latest in a series of fire sales by the four surviving sons of Malcolm Forbes - himself the son of the founder of the glossy business magazine that bears his name. It is the revenue from these disposals that, over the past few years, has helped sustain the family dynasty in the economic downturn.

In many families, the sale of such treasures might cause friction. But the Forbes brothers who now run the publishing business can claim to be acting in Malcolm's name.

"I've often told my children I hope that, if they decide to be done with one of the collections, they will put it back on the auction block so that other people can have the same fun and excitement that we did in amassing it,'' he wrote, shortly before his death.

Malcolm Forbes was certainly a man who knew how to enjoy his money. While his magazine gained circulation unashamedly celebrating the super-rich of the world, Forbes became one of their kind and lived their lifestyle.

He had the yachts and personal jets, the grand houses in the United States, London and Paris and the parties - inviting 800 of his closest friends to his 70th birthday party in Morocco. He owned a South Sea Island.

There was also something of an adventurer in him: he held records for air ballooning and once rode a Harley Davidson from Warsaw to Moscow. He gave millions to charity. In his later years, Elizabeth Taylor was his close companion.

But he was also a collector of almost obsessive zeal, amassing hundreds of paintings, antiques and historical documents, as well as the Fabergé eggs and jewellery. When he bought his 11th Fabergé Imperial egg in 1986, the auctioneer brought the hammer down with the cry: "The score now stands: Kremlin 10, Forbes 11." The next year he made it a round dozen.

Among the oddities he bought was the top hat Abraham Lincoln wore the night he was assassinated. He also amassed a 10,000-strong collection of toy soldiers, the largest in the world.

When he died in 1990, Forbes was said to be worth between $750m and $1.25bn, although modesty forbade his inclusion in the Forbes 400, the magazine's annual league table of America's super rich.

But that was in the 1980s. In the harsher economic climate of the late 1990s, his sons - Steve, Timothy, Robert and Christopher - have struggled to keep the business afloat.

The Forbes influence is now a matter for debate. "I'm not sure whether its required reading any more because there is so much competition from other magazines," one City figure said.

The chief problem it has faced has been the advertising recession and the economic downturn, which has hit all sections of the media badly. In 2002, advertising revenue dropped 16 per cent, the company shed around 25 jobs and some managers were forced to take pay cuts. Its pension plan was suspended.

Although the company keeps its financial cards close to its chest, it denies any serious problems. However one former Forbes employee said: "There was a general feeling that things were not going well, but it was very difficult to find out because they kept things very tight."

Undoubtedly the biggest drain on the family finances has been the two failed attempts to run for the Republican nomination for the United States presidency by Steve Forbes on a vigorous right wing ticket. Mr Forbes, who is editor-in-chief of the magazine, is believed to have spent a total of $66m (£36m) on his 1996 and 2000 campaigns - significantly, he is not running again this year.

Unable to shed any spare companies in order to keep the core business afloat, the family has turned to the collections amassed by Forbes senior. In 2001, a collection of American paintings and sculpture realised $4.6m. Since then, a first Fabergé sale raised $6m and an auction of historical documents, including a manuscript of Abraham Lincoln's last speech, raised $30m.

A year ago, Christopher Forbes, another brother, raised £16.9m by selling 350 pre-Raphaelite and Victorian paintings from his collection housed at the families' London home, the Christopher Wren-designed Old Battersea House. It was a collection he began with his father's encouragement at the age of 17. He hinted at the tensions within the family when he was quoted as saying: "If I could have the money and not have to sell the paintings I wouldn't sell them. This was a family decision."

But the Fabergé sale is by far the most spectacular. Ironically, Forbes' original dozen is now reduced to nine, the other three being re-classified by Sotheby's as not commissioned by the Russian Tsar. But they are also for sale.

The highlight of the auction will be the five-inch high diamond encrusted Coronation Egg, commissioned by Tsar Nicholas II after he was crowned in Moscow to present to his Tsarina in Easter 1897, the most important date in the Orthodox calendar. It is estimated to fetch at least $18m.

So the Forbes have opened the vaults again and brought out some of the family's most prized possessions, which are sure to keep them in sufficient funds for the foreseeable future.

In a statement, they said: "The sale will allow each of us to pursue our own individual interests, something our family has valued."

Masterpieces

By Will Parkhouse

Peter Carl Faberge, the man behind the eggs, was born in 1846 in St Petersburg, and had his education and apprenticeship as a goldsmith in Germany. He refined his skills and, at the age of 24, inherited his father Gustave's jewellery workshop in St Petersberg. With his younger brother Agathon, Peter made copies of ancient Russian treasures. Before then, the belief was that the value was based on the precious metals and stones jewellery contained. But Faberge believed jewellery could be changed into art that transcended the value of the bullion. In 1885, Faberge was told by Tsar Alexander III to create a jewelled egg as a gift for his wife, Marie. The ordinary-looking egg, filled with tiny but expensive surprises, was such a success one was made every year until 1894 and presented to the Tsarina each Easter. Alexander's successor, Nicholas II, is thought to have commissioned 46 eggs for his wife, Alexandra, and his mother, the Dowager Empress.

Bizarrely, Peter Carl Faberge did not create any of the eggs which bear his name. Those responsible were master jewellers Michael Evlampievich Perchin and Henrik Wigstrom.