Footed nut dishes from Paul Storr?

British Silver Reading Silver Hallmarks
1

Hoping you can help me identify these four lovely sterling footed “nut dishes”. They look like they may be from silversmith Paul Storr (photos attached).

Each has the following marks (left to right): Crowned leopard’s head, date letter “N”, lion passant, and head of George III and maker’s mark of Paul Storr.

Each of the four “nut dishes” are: WEIGHT: 94 grams; DIMENSIONS: Height: 2 inches; Length 3 ¾ inches; Width: 2 ½ inches

My three questions are:

  1. Can you confirm the silversmith (Paul Storr or someone else?)
  2. From the markings, can you provide some background/history?
  3. Any idea what the value may be for these four footed nut dishes?
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2

My immediate reaction is that these are not Paul Storr. Although he did register a mark in a rectangular punch it appears to have only been used in 1793 and this purports to be 1808. I say “purports” because I think that the whole hallmark may be a forgery, or at best a pseudo-hallmark. I may of course be totally wrong and in that case I apologise for any upset I may have caused. In any case I urge you to get them checked by a qualified person.

3

A quick follow-up on my previous remarks…

I am now more convinced that this is not right for the following reasons:

  • I would expect the hallmark to be in the order crowned leopard’s head, lion passant, date letter, duty mark.

  • The hallmark and maker’s mark appear to have been applied at the same time as there seems to have been some effort to centralise the set of marks; normally the assay marks were applied at the assay office and the maker’s mark by the maker himself so this alignment would not normally appear on a genuine hallmark.

  • The N overlaps the lion passant - not conclusive in itself, but this is not what I would have expected to see.