Henry Holland 741859-1879 has the most similarity to the makers mark on the fork. The first two hall marks seems to indicate 1697, although also bearing similarities to 1699,1716, and 1721. The “t” seems to point to 1696-1697 although the shape of the stamp seems to be more similar to the one from 1874. You then have the queen Victoria head duty mark. Does anyone know why there would be conflicting hallmarks?
Hate to disappoint you, but in this case, it really is Queen Victoria rather than Queen Anne. The hallmark is for Britannia silver, rather than sterling, London, 1874:
For Britannia silver, the seated Britannia and lion’s head erased replace the lion passant and leopard of sterling:
The maker is Henry Holland:
Ahh Thank you very much. I did think it was unlikely to be pre 1700 given the clarity and lack of wear on the hallmarks. I appreciate you taking your time to respond.
Don’t feel badly about being misled. The placing of Victorian hallmarks on the stem rather than the broad logical platform of the handle is calculated to do exactly that; suggest an earlier era when hallmarks were routinely stamped on the stems of Hanoverian or earlier flatware which was then pinched into somewhere between difficult to read and oblivion when returned to the maker’s shop for buffing, polishing and decorating.
CRWW
On top of that, flatware sometimes suffers from a lot more vigorous polishing than holloware, simply because it’s used more often, and gets grubby. As a result, the hallmarks tend to blur into oblivion, particularly if you’re looking for something like the punch shape. Often, a vague rectangle is all that’s left.