EARLY 19TH CENTURY

Although the designer and maker of these jewel-like candlesticks is not identified, they are similar in their overall chasing and design to a set of candlesticks of tripod stem construction designed by Etienne Martincourt, (recorded 1763-1791) of which a signed pair is in the Wallace Collection, London, and an unsigned pair with slight variation is in the Frick Collection, New York, see P. Hughes The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Furniture, vol. III, London, 1996, pp. 1240-1246, and T. Dell, Furniture in the Frick Collection, vol. VI, New York, 1992, pp. 287-294. The Martincourt design differs from this set primarily in the use of infants' heads to the top of the tripod base versus the bold rams' heads found on the present examples.
A pair of candlesticks of almost identical design was in the collection of Sir Richard Wallace, Bt., at Hertford House, Manchester Square, London, and subsequently with Jacques Seligmann, Paris, and acquired by Mrs. Henry Walters. This pair of candlesticks was sold from her collection at Parke-Bernet Galleries, New York, 30 April - 3 May 1941, lot 1384, at which point the design was attributed to Gouthière. Another very similar pair was with Didier Aaron in 1981, and a further pair was sold in Paris, 13 June 1961, lot 31. Most recently, a set of four candlesticks of almost identical design were sold from the collection of Nelson Grimaldi Seabra; Christie’s, New York, 22 October 2003, lot 148 ($74,090).