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posted 01-18-2010 09:07 AM            

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[26-1948]

I would like to identify what the following marks mean:

Know marks are warn, they have been placed on the spoon in the following picture (included for identification purposes):-

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posted 01-19-2010 09:04 AM            

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Hi jjjarvis and welcome to the forum. We are a small forum of silver enthusiasts and we welcome everyone who wishes to join us in our discussions. However, we are unlike many other forums in that we ask that new people please briefly introduce themselves before joining in (that is the purpose of the material in the yellow box at the top of the page). Could you please tell us tell us a bit about your interest in silver, what you hope to learn from your question, and what is your purpose in asking?

Kimo
Contributing Editor

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posted 01-19-2010 08:12 PM            

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At the moment, I am looking for work - I have been asked to check some spoons that are hallmarked. Only know about silver mint marks, but do not know how to read these hallmarks (would really like to know how to do this before buying a book).

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posted 01-20-2010 02:31 PM            

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Thanks jjjarvis. These appear to be markings indicating silver plate rather than silver. I am a bit confused that when you mention you are doing this for someone else and that you need information for other websites. Are you interested in pre-sale research on these?

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posted 01-21-2010 01:19 PM            

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Can confirm that one area I am looking at is sales - and I am investigating this spoon for a Charity that is local to myself. Would not ask for any kind of valuation here though - but can be considered as a pre-sales investigation (nobody in the charity really knows how to read these hallmarks - I suspected they may indicate Silver Plate, but would rather check).

This spoon was given to the charity without any information - and they asked me to check whether it was silver (think I have others with an additional marking that this spoon does not have - which I suspect is a makers mark rather than a hall mark).

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posted 01-21-2010 06:16 PM            

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Thanks, jjjarvis. Unfortunately this particular forum is not the best place for pre-sale research, even for charities, though searching the archives here does provide quite a bit of useful information for whatever purpose one wishes to use it. There are other websites that you might find helpful that are easy to find by searching on words and phrases such as silver marks and hallmarks - note that the word hallmark officially only applies to English silver markings while the term silver marks is the correct term to use for markings of all other countries. Such websites provide some of the more commonly encountered markings you see on silver. Silver plate markings can also be found, but there is much less information on them since there has not been much government control over these and there have been just so many of them compared to silver markings over the years. Perhaps such websites will meet most or all of your needs, but if not there is an excellent listing of silver books under the link at the very bottom of every page in this forum. It is the link called 'silver library' A couple of good books to acquire for a start would be "Encyclopedia fo American Silver Manufacturers" by Rainwater, and "International Hallmarks on Silver" by Tardy. To see if you find them useful for your needs you could likely get them on loan from your library, or if they do not have them you could ask them to get them from another library for you on interlibrary loan.

Regards,
Kimo

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posted 01-21-2010 09:36 PM            

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Pinder Brothers, Sheffield, England.

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posted 01-24-2010 01:05 PM            

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Many Thanks

Jon Jarvis

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posted 01-28-2010 09:20 AM            

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The above is par of a collection of spoons, which I have now managed to identify as being a collection - but not a set of identical - there is 2 of the above silver plate spoons, as well as a couple of Silver Plate spoons from Henry Hobson. Trying to identify whether following is silver plate (both pics are from 1 spoon):

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posted 01-28-2010 10:04 AM            

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If you use the wonderful Search function you will get a number of posts that will answer your question.

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posted 02-01-2010 10:53 AM            

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Have now checked the nice search facility. Accept that Potosi Silver is a nickel alloy now - with thanks. Have done further investigations with this search, just to see how good it really is - and the view I came to is that it is a good search engine with a limited scope - could be more helpful if more information was available within its search area (for information, I was using the word PURISSIMA - with my luck the meaning of this word will be similar to POTOSI SILVER, but it has not been defined within this forum, which is the scope of the search engine). Still think that the search engine is good for what it can do.

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posted 02-01-2010 05:59 PM            

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That is correct, Potosi Silver has no silver in it - it is simply a nickel alloy. There are also many other terms that have been developed by companies trying to market their wares and imply that they are silver when they are not.

Do you have a photo of your item with the word PURISSIMA on it? I am not sure I have seen this word, but hopefully others here have. Unless there are silver marks my guess is that it is just another marketing term made up by a maker to help sales.

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posted 02-02-2010 01:52 PM            

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Decided to show the markings - even though they are similar to the Potosi Silver mark (which leads me to assume that this fiddle style spoon is a similar manufacture - probably not silver, but some alloy / composit / plate). The mark I mentioned before is as follows :-

Its associated marks, which are separate from the above are below (I assume these are the marks to identify the manufacturer similar to silver):-

Would like to identify what this fiddle style spoon is made from (probably 20th century UK, like the rest).

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posted 02-03-2010 10:59 AM            

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Just done some more investigating of this item. Apparently, Purissima is Italian for Pure - unsure as to the relevance, but if it is, the next question is pure what? That may be defined within the other set of marks on this spoon (which is similar to the one at the start of this blog).

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posted 02-03-2010 01:25 PM            

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I haven't come across "purissima" before but I am sure Kimo is right and it is just a fancy name for a range in nickel alloy or in e.p.n.s. - meant to imply quality, but really pretty meaningless in that case.

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posted 02-04-2010 08:09 AM            

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With all probability (and considering that the other spoons I received from the same source are either Nickel Alloy or EPNS), I also consider that this is Nickel Alloy or EPNS (unless somebody knows different - which is why I placed the information). Should improve what can be found using the search (especially useful for newbies).

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All times are ET