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Hi Forum,

Just recieved this set of 4 Irish tablespoons today. They are approximately 21.6cm (8.5") long and weigh about 73g each. They were likely gilt and engraved at some point during the 19th century in the Victorian berry spoon era. Considering the berries are engraved instead of embossed using a press, I am wondering if these are earlier examples of berry spoons?

I have identified the assay marks as Dublin 1753. The maker mark is a bit rubbed but appears to be an upside down Christopher Skinner? Looking for confirmation on Christopher Skinner and any comment if it is abnormal for the maker mark to be upside down compared to the assay marks?

The references I used to ID the marks are from the http://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk website.

Maker's mark:
https://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk/Mak ... AE.html#CS

Date mark:
https://www.silvermakersmarks.co.uk/Dat ... s%20G.html

I agree with you that the hallmark is Dublin 1753 and that the maker is Christopher Skinner. Although I cannot say that the same is true for Dublin, I can say that the practice in London was for the Goldsmiths Company assayer to mark items with the hallmark and to return them to the silversmith for him to apply his own mark. So there was no particular need to ensure that it was oriented in the same way as the other marks. London makers' marks are frequently seen upside down in relation to the hallmark, although particularly when in horizontal configuration.

Phil

A correction to my previous post: The maker's mark was struck before items were submitted for assay, but still on a different occasion. The assayer would no doubt have had a preferred orientation for his marking.

Thanks for the confirming the marks and providing the details regarding the assay process.

Today I found another set of 5 matching Christopher Skinner spoons that had been for sale, with 3 of the makers marks up-side down and 2 right-side up, so it appears that Christopher Skinner put very little thought into the orientation of his mark.

I came to realize that my phone's default camera setting has somewhat of a fish eye effect and noticed the pictures above look particularly distorted. One more photo that is closer to the true appearance.