A Pair of Gilt Bronze and Blue John Vases after the model by Matthew Boulton, with removable three-light candelabra arms, probably 19th Century, the lower section possibly earlier in date with alterations

Sotheby's New York, 20-23 April 1983, lot 725

Michael M. Thomas, 'Bellagio House. The David Murdock Estate in Bel-Air', Architectural Digest, February 1987, p.57

The lower section of this pair corresponds to a model produced by the Birmingham silversmith and ormolu manufacturer Matthew Boulton that Nicholas Goodison has identified as 'Burgoyne's Vases', named after Colonel (later General) Burgoyne, who acquired a pair of 'girandoles' from Boulton in 1771 believed to have been of this design. John Burgoyne (1722-92) was the son-in-law of the eleventh Earl of Derby and best known for his defeat at the Battle of Saratoga during American Revolutionary War in 1777. A pair of Burgoyne Vases with white marble bodies, probably from the Stroganoff Collection in St Petersburg sold by the Soviet Government in Berlin in 1931, are now at Temple Newsam, Leeds, and another pair in Blue John was sold Christie's London, 3 July 1997, lot 75 (Nicholas Goodison, Matthew Boulton: Ormolu, London 2002, p.298-301 figs. 263-6 and Appendix I p.407).

A significant proportion of Boulton's ormolu production was exported to Continental Europe and particularly Russia, where local metalworkers would have been able to modify or copy his designs.