Help understanding British Silver Standards Marks 925 &

[onenorthernlight]

Hello,

I was looking through the British Hallmarks page on this Site and I am confused and need clarification.

On the main page in section "1. Silver Standard Marks" it shows "E" as the Harp with the Crown over it to be the Irish .925 mark where as on the page for Irish Maker / Date Letter Marks it shows the seated person is the Sterling Mark and the harp with crown to be the Dublin City Mark.

I actually came here because I wanted to confirm the information re Britannia Mark (.958) given in my copy of Antique Marks published by Collins 2006. In the book the Britannia mark shown appears seated the same (facing left) as the Irish Sterling Mark. The Britannia Mark on this site is seated differently (facing right.) I believe that the Mark given on this Site would be the appropriate Britannia Mark but would like this confirmed.

(A side note is that the book I have contains information on date letter codes beyond the dates given on your site. ie for London up to 2009)

Thanks in advance for helping me understand the information given.
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[dognose]

Hi,

The Crowned Harp is the fineness mark, 925/1000, used by the Dublin Assay Office as laid down by the charter of 1637. In 1730 an Act of Parliament imposed a duty of 6d per oz. on all gold and silverwares, the Dublin Company at that point added an extra mark, the figure of Hibernia, to denote that the duty had been paid. Over the years the use of the Hibernia mark has lost its meaning and it is now generally accepted as the mark of the Dublin Goldsmiths Company.

The Britannia mark has been in use since 1697 and of course there has been many variations of the mark, I guess when you've sitting down for over three hundred years you would shuffle about a bit.

Regards Trev.
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[onenorthernlight]

Hi,

The Crowned Harp is the fineness mark, 925/1000, used by the Dublin Assay Office as laid down by the charter of 1637. In 1730 an Act of Parliament imposed a duty of 6d per oz. on all gold and silverwares, the Dublin Company at that point added an extra mark, the figure of Hibernia, to denote that the duty had been paid. Over the years the use of the Hibernia mark has lost its meaning and it is now generally accepted as the mark of the Dublin Goldsmiths Company.

The Britannia mark has been in use since 1697 and of course there has been many variations of the mark, I guess when you've sitting down for over three hundred years you would shuffle about a bit.

Regards Trev.

I am asking about this information because I am starting to collect Irish Sterling Jewelry.

All the pieces I have so far have a seated person.

According to your response, this mark is either an erroneous obsolete Duty mark (Hibernia) or all the items I have are 95.8% fineness and the mark I am seeing is Britannia? What I do not understand is the relationship between the terms Assay Offices and Goldsmiths Company. Are they the same thing?

As well, to further confuse things the Britannia mark can exist as right or left facing so there is no consistency which means it might under some conditions be confused with the Hibernia mark?

The Britannia mark's only purpose is as a content /Standard mark which was /is used to denote 95.8% fineness.

Also, the Crowned Harp is both the mark used to denote the Dublin Essay Office, as well as the Standard (Fineness) Mark. They are one and the same?

(Okay, I know I'm pretty sure I'm not an idiot and its not fair to gaslight a discussion by changing relevant information while I am still trying to figure this out.)

Yesterday the Hibernia(?) mark was described (on the Irish Date Letters and Maker's Marks information page on this site) as the 92.5% fineness mark. Today the information is switched and the Hibernia(?) mark is being described as the Dublin mark with the Crowned Harp as the 92.5% Fineness Mark.

I know what I saw yesterday because I went back and double-checked my information a few times before wasting Board space posting this topic.

If I was only slightly confused before there is no way for me to trust I'll figure this out now.
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[onenorthernlight]

p.s. If you are in the process of updating this site, I think it is important that all information be presented in a consistent manner. The image of the City and Fineness marks displayed for Dublin on the British Hallmarks Overview page should be switched so that the City Mark appears first and the Fineness Mark to the right of it. All the other marks display in this manner, City first followed by the 92.5% (Sterling) Fineness mark.
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[doc]

This is a topic that I have learned a bit about recently. While the Britannia and Irish Hibernia marks look similar, there are a few differences. The Britannia mark has a trident and the figure faces forward, while the Hibernia mark has a scepter and faces sideways. More importanly, however, Irish makers rarely, if ever, marked their Brittania silver with a Britannia mark. I recently acquired a pair of Irish Britannia serving spoons, and was only identified through look and testing, as there was no mark.
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[onenorthernlight]

Thank you doc :-)

Someone told me that in the Hibernia mark the person is sat on a Harp. After pointing this out to me I recognized the shape.
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[larkfield]

A question - was Brittania mark ever used in Dublin, as I understand when the Brittania standard came in to replace Sterling in 1697 - 1720, the Charter did not reach some of the outlying assay offices, and Dublin was one. So would Dublin have had a Brittania punch? Presumeably now adays Dublin Brittania standard would have the 958 numeral mark.
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[onenorthernlight]

I would also be interested to know about which locations used the Brittania Mark.

Also, I came back to add that I found the Hibernia Mark in my Collins book in the section on International Hallmarks. It is not listed with the UK Hallmarks but with the Continental /Europe Marks.
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