Bob Dylan's lyric draft sells for over $US500,000

The original handwritten lyrics of an early draft of Bob Dylan's hit Mr Tambourine Man have sold at auction for $US508,000 ($A815,000).

The 83-year-old US legend was the subject of a sale from Julien's Auctions in Nashville, with over 60 items - including photos, music sheets, a guitar, and art work - going under the hammer, generating almost $US1.5 million in sales.

And the typewritten two pages of Dylan's drafted lyrics to Mr Tambourine Man accounted for one third of the total sales. The yellow sheets of paper also included the folk legend's handwritten annotations to the three drafts of the 1965 songs.

The next highest-selling items were a 1968 oil-on-canvas painting created and signed in 1968 and a custom 1983 Fender guitar which he had owned and played, which went for $US260,000 and $US225,000 respectively.

All but 10 of the lots were from the personal collection of late music journalist Al Aronowitz. His son Myles told the New York Times newspaper he'd found Dylan's lyrics while searching through 250 boxes of his father's "remarkable" collection over a period of several years.

He noted: "He never threw anything away."

The journalist had previously claimed Dylan had written the original drafts in his New Jersey home after splitting from girlfriend Suze Rotolo.