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Lot Essay
The 'C' couronné poinçon was a tax mark employed on any alloy containing copper between March 1745 and February 1749.
The design for these candlesticks is closely related to those executed by Juste-Aurèle Meissonnier (1675-1750) and illustrated in his Livre d’ornemens, folio 36 and 7. Meissonnier was one of the greatest proponents of the genre pittoresque, now known as the Rococo. The son of a silversmith and sculptor, he moved to Paris in 1718 and went on to succeeded Jean Bérain II as dessinateur de la Chambre et du Cabinet du Roi. A closely related pair of candlesticks is in the Wallace Collection, London, reproduced in F.J.B. Watson, Wallace Collection Catalogues, 1956, p. 21, nos. F78-79. Watson refers to a further pair in the San Donato sale, Paris, 21 April, 1870, lot 1599, possibly those sold from the collection of the late Wendell Cherry, Sotheby's New York, 20 May 1994, lot 34. Other examples executed in gilt-bronze alone are recorded: one pair from the collection of Barons Nathaniel and Alphonse de Rothschild, Vienna, was sold from the collection of Mr. Akram Ojjeh, Sotheby's Monaco, 25-26 June 1979, lot 168. Another pair, formerly in the Wrightsman Collection, was sold at Sotheby's New York, 31 October 1981, lot 254 (see also F.J.B. Watson, The Wrightsman Collection, vol. II, 1966, no. 1267 A,B).
The design for these candlesticks is closely related to those executed by Juste-Aurèle Meissonnier (1675-1750) and illustrated in his Livre d’ornemens, folio 36 and 7. Meissonnier was one of the greatest proponents of the genre pittoresque, now known as the Rococo. The son of a silversmith and sculptor, he moved to Paris in 1718 and went on to succeeded Jean Bérain II as dessinateur de la Chambre et du Cabinet du Roi. A closely related pair of candlesticks is in the Wallace Collection, London, reproduced in F.J.B. Watson, Wallace Collection Catalogues, 1956, p. 21, nos. F78-79. Watson refers to a further pair in the San Donato sale, Paris, 21 April, 1870, lot 1599, possibly those sold from the collection of the late Wendell Cherry, Sotheby's New York, 20 May 1994, lot 34. Other examples executed in gilt-bronze alone are recorded: one pair from the collection of Barons Nathaniel and Alphonse de Rothschild, Vienna, was sold from the collection of Mr. Akram Ojjeh, Sotheby's Monaco, 25-26 June 1979, lot 168. Another pair, formerly in the Wrightsman Collection, was sold at Sotheby's New York, 31 October 1981, lot 254 (see also F.J.B. Watson, The Wrightsman Collection, vol. II, 1966, no. 1267 A,B).