Robert Hennell

A Magnificent Set of Four George III Candlesticks

Robert Hennell

A Magnificent Set of Four George III Candlesticks

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+44 (0)20 7242 7624

London, 1819
Maker’s mark of Robert Hennell II

Height: 30.5 cm, 12 in
Weight: 5,000 g, 160 oz 15 dwt

Each candlestick of twisting pillar form cast and applied with laurel and berries climbing the twisting Solomonic columns terminating in Composite capitals. The Solomonic column, also called barley-sugar column, is a helical column, characterized by a spiralling twisting shaft like a corkscrew. It is not associated with a specific classical order, although most examples have Corinthian or Composite capitals.

The shaped octagon bases with ovolo pearls rising to meet a frieze of roman masks and alternating shells symbolising Venus.

DESCRIPTION

As part of the classical heritage, fully valid throughout the Middle Ages and the Golden Age, the laurel was still during this time the symbol of power, the military triumph, the gift of prophecy and, above all, the symbol of poetry as well as the sign of glory which can be achieved through the arts.

It was also associated with it the belief, preserved to the present day and very much alive in our classical literature, that laurel cannot be struck by lightning. On the other hand, its branches were both the symbol and trophy of the heroic poetry, whereas myrtle was suitable for the erotic and the ivy for the minor poetry, mainly the pastoral or bucolic, but in spite of this, laurel is often used as seasoning and with its symbolic meaning in eclogues and pastoral books. Finally laurel is associated with love: Petrach, together with his followers, used it to refer to his beloved Laura, by means of the phonic association, and sometimes semantic as well, between Laura and laurel; and as for the Ovidian legend that tells Apollo's love for the nymph Daphne, who was turned into a laurel, its different versions, the serious as well as the burlesque ones, were plentiful during the Renaissance and Baroque periods.