Rare Pair of Early 18th-Century Hungarian Silver Altar Sticks

dated 1720, by Henricus Goldner, Sopron, each with a baluster standard raised on a tripartite scroll base and surmounted by a drip-pan and pricket, the whole richly ornamented with repousse and chased scrolls, flowers and volutes, inscribed around the baluster base "Ioan[nes] Adam Gansel : Philo[sophiae] & Med[icinae] Doctor : Quis Legavit Ad. 1720".
h. 32-1/2", w. 13-1/4"; weighted

Literature: Judt H. Kolba, Hungarian Silver: The Nicolas M. Salgo Collection (London: Thomas Heneage, 1997), p. 88, item 76c.

Notes: This handsome pair of altar sticks, along with two others, were commissioned in 1720 by Dr. Joan Adam Gansel for St. Michael's Church in Sopron, Hungary. They were sold by the church in 1860 to Trausdorf Church in Burgenland, Austria, where they remained until 1969. They were acquired in 1980 by Nicolas M. Salgo (1914-2005), Hungarian-born builder of the Watergate Complex and Reagan's Ambassador to Hungary who, while in service as the latter, began to amass what would come to be regarded as the finest collection of Hungarian silver in private hands. After his death, much of his collection was retained by the Salgo Trust for Education, with some items - including the present lot - sold for the benefit of the trust.