AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



February, 1913 



HERE is an irresistible charm about old all the more eagerly for this ware. Let us not pass by as 

 pewter, although we look curiously at the worthless, excellent and valuable pieces of this metal that 

 enthusiastic collectors and often wonder why bear no mark, for we find out of fifty-nine vessels that are 

 they are so imbued with the love of this old still used in twenty-nine churches in the diocese of Llandaff 

 metal. But when we, too, become incited that there are only fifteen marked. The older pieces are 

 by the same spirit, we realize the absorbing indicated generally by a greater simplicity of design, as for 



instance, the straight or slightly waved lines were made 



before the curved pieces with swelling lines. Also, the plain 



flat lids were made before tops that showed 



interest there is in the pursuit of the genuine old masters 

 Pewter, as it stands to-day, might well be said to represent 

 a lost art. Only about a tenth of the exist- 

 ing pieces of the genuine metal even have 

 no hall mark at all, and often those that 

 do have these hall marks, are so worn that 

 even to the expert there is no absolutely 

 sure guide as there is for the collectors of 

 old china. When one realizes that in the 

 Pewterers' Hall list there are as many as 

 twelve hundred old English marks or 

 touches of which only about forty give the 

 maker's name and the date, and that for 

 names alone, there are only two hundred 

 and fifty, one cannot think it strange that 

 the old Guild of Pewterers should have 

 considered it undignified to advertise, and 

 that the London pewterers prohibited 



An old Jewish pewter lamp owned 



by Mr. I. H. Caliga of Salem, 



Massachusetts 



domes or knobs or crests, and that more 

 elaborate moldings are of later date than 

 the simple ones. 



The metal itself is of little or no intrinsic 

 worth, — in fact, it is nothing more than an 

 alloy of tin and of lead and sometimes a 

 sprinkling of copper, antimony and bismuth. 

 Harking back to its early history it is veiled 

 in comparative obscurity. Used for house- 

 hold utensils, it dates back to the middle 

 ages and beyond. In fact, it is an impossi- 

 bility to go back far enough to ascertain the 

 period when it was first used in China and 

 Japan, for it is to those countries we are 

 compelled to return for the origin of many 



placing name and address which bore touch on any of their of the old industries, as those workmen excelled in this 

 wares. art as they did in everything that they undertook. 



All this confusion of pieces makes the collectors search One thing that we can vouch for is that pewter ware was 



Old pewter from the collection of Mr. Nathaniel Spofford of Salem. The pewter measures to the right show the pint, half-pint and gill meas- 

 ures. The pewter wine glasses are of a much later date, but of interest to collectors by reason of their rarity 



