OXFORD (REUTERS) - One of the biggest collections of Alice in Wonderland memorabilia is to be auctioned in Oxford, England.

It features over 3,000 items acquired by the late antiquarian book dealer Thomas Schuster and his wife Greta.

Highlights from the massive collection - to be sold in 360 lots - have been exhibited publicly on two previous occasions: at the Schuster gallery in the late 1990s and at the Tate Modern Liverpool in 2012 as part of an Alice in Wonderland exhibition that later moved to Italy and Germany.

Greta Schuster said she has chosen to sell the collection in Oxford due to the city's close links with the Alice story.

It was famously during a boat trip on the Thames in 1862 that Christ Church College don Charles Dodgson first entertained the 10-year-old Alice Liddell and her sisters with the tale of a girl who fell down a rabbit hole into a world called Wonderland.

The sale with Mallams auctioneers in Oxford is the first opportunity to view the collection in its entirety.