Sweden hallmark help!!!

[lesam678]

I'm looking for help on a hallmark that is suppose to be from Sweden. I would like to know if the piece is Sterling or silver-plate.
http://www.pbase.com/lesam678/inbox

[Margaux]

Solid silver, at least 830/1000 parts silver. As you know sterling is 925/1000. So it can be made of sterling silver or coin silver, but not silver plate.
X4 = made in 1852
The three crowns indicate Sweden
I can't help you on the makers mark.

[Hose_dk]

I can identify the maker and town but I cannot see the mark. Please post a better better picture and write what the letters are ?CS but even the CS I am not sure of. So pleease post a better picture.

[Bahner]

Hello, looks like EGS and X4. In that case it is Eric Gustaf Stenquist from Enkoeping. Active 1846 to 1874. X4 is for 1852. Best wishes, Bahner

[lesam678]

The best I can make out the marks look like EGS, "3" crowns, something that looks like * or a large snowflake, and X4.

So from the previous posts, I understand that it is from Sweden (3 Crowns), dates from 1852 (X4), and the maker Eric Gustaf Stenquist from Enkoeping (EGS), and is some form of silver.

And thank you to those that have responded so quickly.

[Hose_dk]

The snowflake is the city, and the marks are standard swedish marks at that time. My first impresion of the city mark was Jönköping but I could not find any maker that matched.
The mark of Enköping is very similar and there is a maker just like Bahner says.

[Hose_dk]

"and is some form of silver."
Its not just any form of silver. In 1489 standard was set in Sweden. Silver was in parts of 16. Silver was defined as 14,5 out of 16. parts. (called lod) 16 Lod was pure silver and you cannot make anything out of pure siver - one must add another material (copper) to make something that you can (practically) use.

In 1752 standard was set to 13 1/4 corresponding to 828,1
In 1758 they permited also the use of 13 lod - in case you used 13 lod the tax was doubled.

So the frase "and is some form of silver." is not correct - the silver in your piece is silver that is controlled according to standards that are hundreds of years old.

The katfott (cats paw) the 3 crowns is a guarantee that its silver. Today the katfott should be followed by an S.

The standard marks can be divided into 2 parts. "Responsibility marks" set by the maker and "Control marks" set by someone else

The resposibility marks are: maker, lod, and in some periods city and year mark.
The control marks are: city and year marks and various marks (not all present at your piece) provins, guardeinmark, katfott, and after controlmarks (the last used at imported silver)

So congratulations you have a swedish piece with a full mark according to that period. In Sweden the marks was taken very seriously and therefore normally it is very easy to date and locate everything.

The swedish book gives a biography of every maker. EGS started learning to become silver smith on july 6th 1835 at a person called S. Hultgren in Eskilstuna educated in 1840, employed in 1845 by the vidow of J. Sundström. Started in Enköping 1846 untill 1874 where he died. his vidow continued from 1875 until 1877. The book states some documented work from him in various churches and a spoon.