Letter opener, Dutch. Does anyone know which maker represents N21?
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But mine says N21, not N10?
I know, Iâm not blind. I gave you suggestions, including a search engine.
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I asked for help, not hostility. I already tried the Dutch websites, but came up empty - thatâs why I came here. My mistake.
I suppose the problem is the Dutch have this annoying habit of writing about matters of concern to them in Dutch.
This forum is in English, a language invented by the French when they took over the country in 1066 and found the inhabitants then all spoke Anglo-Saxon or Danish.
It was a process which really was still underway when Chauncer wrote his Canterbury Tales a few centuries later.
Now neither Bart or myself are English. He is rather good at Polish and Russian. I can manage a North American version of the language, French albeit with a Quebecois patios, Latin and some rather colourful Norwegian I picked up during a summer of sharing accommodation with two ladies from that country who used their shared language to berate my many failings as a roomy.
In an attempt to understand your finding of our failure I started looking at this page
I do have a friend who spends her life dealing with the Lowlands and their silver and I will, with your permission, forward your inquiry to her.
She probably wonât respond but you never know.
CRWW
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Any help would be appreciated.
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I have seen the N21 makers mark on a 2006 made candestick. Yours is also not very old. It is struck with the small item sword mark 1953 - present which doesnât have an accompanying date letter but is still a current mark. Finding the identity of recent and current makers is very difficult as their marks are generally not known outside of the assay offices where they are registered as there hasnât been enough time nor incentive for them to make it into external references. If you do manage to find it, I would very much appreciate if you could update your post. If I find it, I will do likewise. Cheers, Steve
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I donât use FB.
" Jacob Pieter Niekerk/Firma J.P. Niekerk
Jacob Pieter Niekerk and successors, makerâs marks used: N19 1862-1900, N9 used 1876-1900, N10 used 1901-1943, N20* used 1924-1943, and N20 in octagon used by Jacob Pieterâs widow 1900-1901. Between 1895-1940 the company was led successively by; Jacob Pieter Niekerk (1862-1900), by his widow (Firma J.P. Niekerk 1900-1902), by the brothers Jacob Gerrit Jan and Gerrit Jan Niekerk (1902-1912) and by Jacob Gerrit Jan alone (1912-1945); both last periods as company Gebr. Niekerk. In 1899 the firm J.P. Niekerk bought the âsteam silver factoryâ R.J. Spaanstra & Zn in Groningen. From 1899 to 1927 separate master marks were registered for Schoonhoven and Groningen, under the name Gebr. Niekerk. In 1882, by King William III and Queen Emma, the firma received the predicate âpurveyor to the courtâ continued until 1997."
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This picture of this item appears on a Reddit website asking about the N2 or N21 mark which here looks more like a IN21 mark. There has been no useful response.
Meanwhile I have heard from my auction catalogue lady who says she is on vacation but thinks it is modern and wonders why I am interested, it being somewhat outside of my scope of usual inquiry.
Lacking any intelligent answer I told her it was probably a prop in a complex game of Clue and we had so far determined the Butler did it with a paperknife in the library but we couldnât figure out why or who the vicâ was.
CRWW
Thanks, Steve, much appreciated!
Ha, your last paragraph made me laugh out loud, thanks 
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This appears to be useful synoptic of what Bart has already told us which prompted the vituperative response to the plaintiffâs ââŠbut mine says N21â
https://www.925-1000.com/forum/search.php?keywords=niekerk&sid=4822fd36a9a755ac2e657d377748dd7a
So may we presume these are trademarks rather than assay marks and that the paperknife is made of something or other by someone who might have lived in a Dutch town and quite possibly has a brother or two?
Well the good news, to return to my game of âClueâ, is at least I have figured out who the vicâ is.
I also think I now understand fully the term âdouble dutchâ which until reading the referenced material had, like the victim in Clue, eluded me.
Final Answer" The Butler, in the library with something that might be a paperknife and the victim is âKing William III and Emma.â who were forced to "predicate " the perpâ.
The other forumâs cited too-ing and fro-ing raises another puzzle for me:
How come the Dutch were allowed to ship over a William III to England in 1688 as a sort of spare to James IIâs daughter Mary, his wife ,and here he is still hanging around the lowlands nearly 200 years later now with someone called Emma?
I always thought âWiliam of Orangeâ was something the Whigs had cooked up to take everybodyâs mind off what a complete mess the Tories had made of the anti-Roman Catholic thing they had going when booting out James II and telling him to go hang around on the banks of the River Boyne in Ireland.
Of course he got bored, the fishing there is terrible still, and started all this nonsense of divided the Irish up by religious preference. Stupidest thing possible. All my Irish friends are completely sane, logical people until you allow them a whiff of religion then watch out.
CRWW
CRWW
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