CIRCA 1805, POSSIBLY BY ANDREI SCHREIBER, ST. PETERSBURG, AFTER A MODEL BY CLAUDE GALLE

With their 'Egyptian' stems embellished with priestess's masks, these candlesticks are closely related to a French design executed around 1810 for a candlestick, which is illustrated in H. Ottomeyer/P. Pröschel, Vergoldete Bronzen, Munich, 1986, p. 326, fig. 5.1.6. Very similar examples were supplied by Claude Galle to Fontainebleau in 1804, which were described as '2 paires [flambeaux] à trois têtes' (J.-P. Samoyault, Pendules et Bronzes d'Ameublement entrés sous le Premier Empire, Paris, 1989, no. 155, p. 175). However, the present pair is probably not of French but of Russian manufacture and possibly by the St. Petersburg bronzier Andrei Schreiber (1777-1843), who executed various candlesticks and candelabra with a similar leaf-cast foot.