Help Identifying 24K GOLD ring with ASIAN FLAG LIKE HALLMARK

[carlos1982]

Hello Everyone,

I have a 24KT ring with a Asian lettering or Flag like Hallmark after the 9999, I was hoping that someone here could help me identify it. I was have a hard time taking a picture of the hallmark, so below is the picture and below that is a picture I drew of kind of what the hallmark looks like. Let me know if anyone knows what the hallmark says or is. Thank You

FOR SOME REASON It's telling me my pictures are to wide, so just put the link to the picture.

http://i1166.photobucket.com/albums/q608/cmr3pro/24k/IMG_5206_zpsb77a6aad.jpg
http://i1166.photobucket.com/albums/q608/cmr3pro/24k/IMG_5207_zps3c400cd5.jpg
http://i1166.photobucket.com/albums/q608/cmr3pro/24k/IMG_5220_zps2ef53fab.jpg

[aazul3]

The mark looks to me like the Chinese character 佳, meaning beautiful, but also carrying the phonetic reading of "ka" in Japanese. Don't know if this perhaps has something to do with "karats"...

The other character that this could be is 隹, although unlikely...

Hope that this helps!

Adam

[davidross]

As the OP acknowledges, the photos are not very clear, so what follows is a best-guess scenario based on a mark that is not 100% legible.

Thinking strictly in terms of Chinese / Japanese characters, the mark does resemble the two characters 佳 and　隹. Both of these characters are most commonly used in proper names, but not as part of a guarantee or standard for precious metals.

Thinking in terms of Asian hallmarks on silver and gold, it is more likely that the character is 銀 ("silver") and that the ring is goldplating over silver. The first photo certainly looks like this silver mark. Sometimes this mark becomes elongated when stamped on the inside of a ring, or becomes indistinct if plating is applied over it.

While older Asian gold jewelry may be entirely unmarked, I believe that nearly all Asian gold jewelry produced since the end of WWII, whether for domestic or international markets, has been marked in karats, e.g., 12K, 14K, 18K. On some Japanese gold jewelry, the stamp is K14, K18WG (18 karat white gold), and so on--for instance, see the cigarette cases with gold inlay marked K24:
viewtopic.php?f=13&t=33959&p=88216&hilit=k24#p88216

I have never seen Asian gold stamped .9999, but perhaps this ring is the exception. Comparing with many other Asian pieces, the greatest probability is that the ring is Korean .9999 silver with goldplating. The OP can confirm this by comparing the mark on the ring to the 銀 silver mark pictured in Korean silver marks sections of the "World Marks" page: http://www.925-1000.com/foreign_marks3.html

Hope that this is not a disappointment.

DR