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Help with these scottish teaspoons
Help with these scottish teaspoons
Can anyone confirm the date or maker of these four fiddle pattern Scottish teaspoons - the style of the A doesn't seem to correspond to anything in my pocket guide. Maker's initials are W.B - Many thanks Frank
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Hi Trev. I'll be honest and say I know very little about old Cape silver, even though it's in our own back yard so to speak. Curious to know what about the spoons makes you think they are Cape. Is there a definitive look about Cape work?
I was attracted to the spoons because I knew they were of good age, nicely made and assumed Scottish pre duty mark until the marks didn't quite fit. With Durban being established only about 1840, most of the silver we see here is Victorian or later (late Georgian at the earliest) which is why the early stuff appeals.
I'll try and track down someone who has a copy of Weltz. Most exciting. Thanks Frank
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I was attracted to the spoons because I knew they were of good age, nicely made and assumed Scottish pre duty mark until the marks didn't quite fit. With Durban being established only about 1840, most of the silver we see here is Victorian or later (late Georgian at the earliest) which is why the early stuff appeals.
I'll try and track down someone who has a copy of Weltz. Most exciting. Thanks Frank
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Hi,
Another possibility is that they are forgeries. There was a scandel in Edinburgh in the 1820's involving the Liverpool silversmith John Sutter.
Sutter served his apprenticeship in Edinburgh under Charles Dalgleish. Another apprentice serving under Dalgleish at the same time as Sutter, was Alexander Dick who left Edinburgh in 1824 for Australia, and was soon in trouble with the authorities there. Dick was known to use a pseudo Edinburgh town mark on his colonial wares.
I'm not suggesting these spoons are the work of Dick or Sutter, only to say that there are several possibilities as to their origin.
As for references to Indian colonial silver, which is, as you suggest, is another possibility, I doubt if you will find better than our own on the web.
See: http://www.925-1000.com/AngloIndian_01.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
although quite new, it is growing all the time. In book form, Wynyard R T Wilkinson's 'The Maker's of Indian Colonial Silver - A Register of Europeon Goldsmiths, Silversmiths, Jewellers, Watchmakers and Clockmakers in India and their Marks' is by far the best.
Trev.
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Another possibility is that they are forgeries. There was a scandel in Edinburgh in the 1820's involving the Liverpool silversmith John Sutter.
Sutter served his apprenticeship in Edinburgh under Charles Dalgleish. Another apprentice serving under Dalgleish at the same time as Sutter, was Alexander Dick who left Edinburgh in 1824 for Australia, and was soon in trouble with the authorities there. Dick was known to use a pseudo Edinburgh town mark on his colonial wares.
I'm not suggesting these spoons are the work of Dick or Sutter, only to say that there are several possibilities as to their origin.
As for references to Indian colonial silver, which is, as you suggest, is another possibility, I doubt if you will find better than our own on the web.
See: http://www.925-1000.com/AngloIndian_01.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
although quite new, it is growing all the time. In book form, Wynyard R T Wilkinson's 'The Maker's of Indian Colonial Silver - A Register of Europeon Goldsmiths, Silversmiths, Jewellers, Watchmakers and Clockmakers in India and their Marks' is by far the best.
Trev.
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