King Louis XV of France or his mistress, Madame de Pompadour is supposed to have said this around 1757 either dismissively of struggling people or as a realization that their lavish lifestyle would eventually lead to the collapse of the monarchy and he, like many tyrants, just didn’t care what happened after he was gone.
Good thing we don’t have people in power like that today, huh?
Silver climbed to records in January, losing 30% of its value since and now looking about to climb up again so it seems like the perfect time for some judicial picking of the massive amount of good 19th century gear hitting the market.
Here’s a coin and sterling auction that caught my eye the US side of the Atlantic pond.
William and Robert Wilson, silversmiths working the northern states markets perhaps more successfully than anybody else back then are just two smiths who work is coming up for grabs.
The other forum readers posted this bout them:
The auction is also posted on www.liveauctioneers.com It is one of many US auctions where coin follows sterling and British sterling sometimes goes for silly high prices and other times doesn’t get a bid.
I loaded up on coin on southern road trips in the seventies and I am ex ruris or I’d be bidding not posting. But the auctioneers themselves admit privately spot not rarity may be the primary price determinator.
Not that I would advocate melting these down, but melt value at today’s spot price is about $350 (assuming “coin” means .800 in this case).
Just a casual observation, but 20th Century U.S. silver has been going on eBay for something pretty close to melt. And unlike a regular auction, there’s no buyer’s commission - just sales tax.
Earlier New World silver (19th Century) tends to go higher, depending upon quality and rarity, but almost never tops about 1.5 times melt.
Georgian sterling is more likely to push 2 times melt, unless there’s something truly special about it. Even if there is, pieces struggle to top that mark - I grabbed a Hester Bateman quart tankard, 1784, and a nice 800+ grams, for about 1.75 times melt. I was astonished, but delighted. I got to 2.5 times melt for a small Queen Anne coffee pot, Britannia silver. I call that a bargain.
So where is the spot price going? The consensus seems to be “higher,” but it’s so volatile, no one can really tell. What’s pushing it, of course, are the industrial uses of silver - shielding on data center hardware, solar panels, EV’s, and so on. None of that is fading away.
I think coin silver refers to .900 as in the practice of using US silver coins in early silversmithing which were .900. I think of .800 as more of a mitteleuropa standard.
With less than 2% of total silver production, going into anything but industrial, yes, industry drives the price.
What amazes me is the almost universal lack of interest in one of the most malleable, decorative metals in the world.
A metal capable of being made into objects and delighting the mind when held, but also protecting the health of the user.
An enormous amount of your energy and those of your colleagues are spent in this forum, identifying silver plate.
Given your own comments, I would rate your enthusiasm for plate somewhere below
Synthetic metal alloys created to gull the 19th century public.
Mightn’t it be possible to focus back on sterling or close silver and explore those handcrafting it rather than machines stamping the stuff out ?
Industrial art has its place but not really in my pantry. I’d rather help the craftsmen whether they be 17th century resellers or contemporary artisans.
A case could be made for replying to most posters, “These are the silver collector forums, and your piece is not silver. It’s silverplate / electroplate / pewter / stainless steel / spelter / balsa wood.” End of discussion.
Traffic would drop off quite a bit, however.
I do own one piece of electroplate, and I rather like it, a nice turn-of-the-last-century WMF claret jug. A big boy, at about 13", but no heft to it at all.
