A lost poem written by Jewish schoolgirl Anne Frank before she went into hiding from the Nazis has been revealed after more than 70 years.
The eight-line poem, penned by 12-year-old Ms Frank in Amsterdam in 1942, is now up for auction.
It's written in Dutch and was found in the school book of her best friend's sister, Christiane 'Cricri' Van Maarsen.
Ms Van Maarsen was the older sister of Jacqueline Van Maarsen - Ms Frank's closest school friend.
Ten years after Cricri's death, Jacqueline has decided to put the poem up for auction. It's expected to fetch around NZ$74,000 - well above its reserve price of about NZ$45,000.
"My sister tore this page out of her album and gave it to me around 1970," she told the Mirror.
"I know that my sister was not as attached to this verse from Anne to her as I am to the verse Anne addressed to me, and that is the reason that I am now putting it up for sale."
Translated into English, the poem reads:
Dear Cri-Cri,
If you did not finish your work properly,
And lost precious time,
Then once again take up your task
And try harder than before.
If others have reproached you
For what you have done wrong,
Then be sure to amend your mistake.
That is the best memory one can make.
"It says you have to do your best. If someone criticises you, you have to work harder," Thijs Blankevoort, director of the auction house Bubb Kuyper told AFP.
"It is very significant because it is very rare. Normally a poem like this would already have been donated to a museum or would be kept in small family circles forever.
"There are some chance finds, some books from the libraries. But these are not manuscripts, they are owner entries."
Anne Frank was a German-born Jewish girl whose diary told the story of her experience hiding from the Nazis in World War Two.
In 1944 she was caught and sent to Auschwitz, then to Bergen-Belsen, where she died of typhoid in 1945.
The diary was published in 1947 and has been translated into 67 languages.
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