THE CANDLESTICKS WITH MARK OF GEORGE METHUEN, LONDON, 1748, THE BRANCHES WITH MARK OF JOHN SCOFIELD, LONDON, 1795

CANDELABRA DESIGN
The candelabra are conceived in the French 'picturesque' fashion of the mid 18th century. The triangular bases recall ancient Roman tripod candelabra; whilst their vase-capped 'tripod' pillars are wrapped by Roman acanthus and display Roman wolf-hound pelts in celebration of the ancient 'Normand' family of de Louet (Lovett). The candlesticks were probably commissioned for the old embattled mansion of Liscombe, Buckinghamshire by Robert Lovett, who in 1740 had employed the architect James Gibbs to design a monument to his son Robert. The wolf-hound had featured in a silver pattern invented in the mid 1730s by King George II's architect William Kent (b.c.1685-1748) for James Pelham (b.c.1683-1761), Secretary to Frederick, Prince of Wales, (1707-1752), and published in 1744 in the architect John Vardy's Some Designs of Inigo Jones and William Kent, pl. 29.

The silversmith George Methuen had previously worked in the neighbourhood of Hogarth's St. Martin's Lane Academy, which was a centre for the study of French art and engravings. The candlesticks' picturesque serpentine forms evolved from a tripod candlestick pattern invented by Juste Aurèle Meissonnier (1695-1750), Dessinateur de la Chambre et du Cabinet du Roi and engraved by Desplaces in Chandeliers de Sculpture en Argent, 1728 (see P. Fuhring, Juste-Aurele Meissonnier, London, vol. II, 1999, pp. 318-319.)

SIR JONATHAN LOVETT
The family were of considerable antiquity, deriving from Richardus de Louet who arrived in England from Normandy a short time after the Conquest. His son William Lovett was granted substantial estates in Bedford, Berkshire, Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, and perhaps most notably was made Master of the King's Wolfhounds, an appointment reflected in his choice of arms and in the ornament of these candelabra. His descendant Robert settled at Liscombe in the first years of the 14th century. The estates passed to Jonathan Lovett who was created a baronet in 1781. He returned to the family house at Liscombe, which had not been lived in by the family for over 100 years. He married Sarah, daughter of Jonathan Darby of Leap Castle. Their only son predeceased his father and the title became extinct on Sir Jonathan's death in 1812. His English estates passed to his daughters as co-heirs and his Irish estates devised to his nephew Henry William Lovett.