Assorted English Sterling Silver Serving Flatware Set
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- Sterling Silver - Sterling silver is a mixture of 92.5% pure silver and 7.5% of another metal, usually copper. Fine silver is 99.9% pure silver, and is relatively soft and the addition of the very small amount of copper gives the metal enough strength and hardness to be worked into jewellery, decorative and household objects.
- Finial - An architectural decoration, found on the upper parts of of an object. On furniture they are usually found on pediments, canopies and shelf supports. On smaller ceramic or silver items, such as spoons, they may decorate the top of the item itself, or the lid or cover where they provide a useful handle for removal.
Finials have a variety of shapes and forms. They may be urn-shaped, baluster shaped round or spiral, but usually taper into an upper point. Many real life shapes may also be used as finials, such as pineapples, berries, pinecones, buds, lotus and acorns. Sometimes animals such as a lion are depicted, or fish and dolphins. - Georgian - As an English stylistic period, Georgian is usually taken to cover the period from George I (1714) to the Regency of Prince George (1811-20), although the period from 1800 to 1830 is sometimes designated as the Regency period. During the Georgian period the great English cabinetmakers and designers such as Chippendale, Hepplewhite, Adam Sheraton etc., were all active.
Therefore there isn't a single 'Georgian style' as such and to say something is 'Georgian', usually means it was made between 1714 and 1830. This assumes we discount George V and George VI, both being from the 20th century.
The styles popular at the time of each reign were:
George I (1714-1727) saw out the last years of the Baroque period.
George II (1727-1760) reigned during the Rococo period.
George III (1760-1820) saw the last gasp of the Rococo, all of the early Neo-Classic 'Adam style' and most of the later neo-Classic 'Regency style'.
George IV (Prince Regent 1820-1830)encompassed the last of the 'Regency' style.
William IV's reign (1830-1837) was something of a no man's land (stylistically) and he wasn't a 'George' anyway. He covered the last glimmerings of 'Regency' and the start of the 'Victorian' style. - Flatware - An alternative name for items of cutlery, principally knives, forks and spoons, now generally used to describe sets of these implements. Nowadays it is mostly used when describing cutlery made of silver and silver plate.
It is less frequently used to describe all "flat' items of tableware, so that as well as cutlery the definition includes plates. - Marrow Spoon - A spoon with a long handle and a narrow scoop shaped bowl, used to scoop and eat marrow from the hollow centre of roasted bones. Some marrow scoops are double ended with a different shaped bowl at each end.
- William Iv - William IV was King of the United Kingdom and King of Hanover from 26 June 1830 until his death in 1837, and in English furniture design it represented the brief period between the end of the Regency period, and the beginning of the Victorian period.
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