# Are any of these items silver or silver plated?



## kkmonte (May 6, 2013)

Hi everyone, a friend of mine gave me all of these items because was cleaning her house. I'm not sure if they are silver, silver plated, or something entirely different. Her grand father used to be a minister and most of the items came from him. The only trademark I can find is on the big serving platter, it says "made in italy" and i've shown the marks on the front and the back. Everything else looks like tarnished silver, but i'm no silver expert.  Any help identifying these items would be appreciated. 

If these have any value, i'd love to send them over to scrapman in exchange for some of his rounds! Let me know.

Picture Set # 1


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## kkmonte (May 6, 2013)

Picture Set #2


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## kkmonte (May 6, 2013)

Picture set #3

Only trademark found on bottom of large platter, it says Made in Italy in those little words.


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## rusty (May 6, 2013)

Excuse me, have you read Hokes Testing Precious Metals.

It's impossible to answer your question is any of this 925 Sterling Silver with out doing some tests on each object. It's people like you that are making Cash for Gold filthy rich.

You have the resources right here on this forum to learn the methods used to determine the purity of your silver be it Sterling or Silver Plate.

My first suggestion would be study the hallmarks, you may find that you have a priceless piece of history worth a hundred times the current value of silver. You may find that some of your silver came from the Vatican.

And I'm still not committing myself to saying what you have is 925 Sterling, could be cheap plate.


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## element47.5 (May 7, 2013)

It's very, very rare to find "silver" items made from sterling that are not clearly marked "sterling". Any maker who made such a piece would have a tough time selling the item for more than what it might fetch as a plated item. So why would they do it? I have not found any sterling item made in the last 120 years that was not marked "STERLING" or "925/1000". The exceptions might be: Teeny tiny pieces of jewelry, which I do not handle very much; items where I do not recognize or cannot find the hallmark. I've handled many, many plates/platters of the kind you've pictured, and some are sterling and some are not. There has never been any question, the sterling ones are very clearly stamped STERLING.


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## GOLDbuyerCA (May 7, 2013)

*Nice plated items * the oxide, and copper / brass press shows they are plated items. still very nice, worth tens of dollars, here in Vancouver metro auctions. NOT Sterling. Cheers, keep an eye out.


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## kkmonte (May 7, 2013)

Hoke? Is she some new member on this forum? LOL.

Thanks for the kind words of wisdom Rusty. I never said I was going to sell this stuff to Cash for Gold. And I thought I clearly said that only one out of the 10 pieces had a hallmark on it? My question was more of a, could this stuff be real silver (or sterling) without any hallmarks at all.

Thanks Element47.5 and GoldbuyerCA for the useful responses.


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## rusty (May 7, 2013)

kkmonte said:


> Hoke? Is she some new member on this forum? LOL.
> 
> Thanks for the kind words of wisdom Rusty. I never said I was going to sell this stuff to Cash for Gold. And I thought I clearly said that only one out of the 10 pieces had a hallmark on it? My question was more of a, could this stuff be real silver (or sterling) without any hallmarks at all.
> 
> Thanks Element47.5 and GoldbuyerCA for the useful responses.



Yes it is possible to have early pieces of sterling not marked as such this is why I suggested you research the stamps. Early silver could be 950 or 925 alloy, the lion stamp ( King of Beasts ) is often representative of sterling.

These early hallmarks ( the stamps ) can be fun to research, one stamp indicates purity, one belongs to the silversmith another to the town or village of manufacture. It is these early pieces of silver that could be collector or museum pieces.

Not everything we come across belongs in the melting pot.


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## skippy (May 7, 2013)

I've seen Russian silver, and Swedish silver which doesn't have 925 or sterling on it. Worldwide various marks have been used. Usually if something is solid silver it will be marked somehow in a standard manner though. Like Rusty said, research it, there's a couple of good sites on the web for hallmarks. 

I have had some simple twisted wire bracelets cross my path that were silver and had no hallmarks or stampings at all. They may have been the effort of a hobby jeweller. There are also silver plated item which I've seen marked with a series of fancy looking pseudo hallmarks on it. If you are not 100% sure it's often best to pass.


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## pimpneightez (May 7, 2013)

Looks plated to me but if you don't have testing material I would use a hack saw and cut a little slice into the plate. I usually find brass and you'll see a yellow shine. If it's plated over something else like nickle this might not work.


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