Russian Marks?

[AntiqueRevival]

Howdy From Texas,

We found some unusual candlestands with beautiful chimneys in an estate we purchased.  We are not familiar with the markings on the candlestands and we have attached a photo of the mark and the gilded line on the chimneys.  Any help would be appreciated, thanks...Eric  The links to the photo files are below, either click or copy and paste in your address bar.

http://users.ev1.net/~younkin/r1.jpg

http://users.ev1.net/~younkin/r2.jpg

[David_Pritchard]

The outer ring of the mark says xxxxxxxx in Moscow and the inner ring bears the cypher of Emperor Nicholas I (died 1855) with the word Gratitude over it. The gilt symbol on glass shade is that of the Shah of Persia.

What does this mean? We can only speculate.  

David

[Mike]

Medals with exactly the same wording "With gratitude" and the cypher of Nicholas I were awarded to workers, contractors and suppliers involved in the Winter Palace restauration after the 1837 fire. The words along the ring read "Sysoev in Moscow" and designate a firm that had apparently been granted the mentioned medal.  P.S. Sysoev was a reputed maker of chimneys (see e.g. here).