Table silver

Pieces of silver cutlery in the so-called Coburg design, which was made around 1831 for the British Colonel Thomas Chaloner Bisse-Challoner

As silverware all of the will Harnesses , cutlery and decorative elements of precious metal referred to a festively decorated table belong. In a figurative sense, silverware is often used to describe certain valuable parts of the property of a person or institution that can be sold in an emergency .

Components of table silver

Table silver in the original sense includes both body goods ( tableware , namely serving platters, plates , bowls of all kinds, sauce boats, saucepans , salt and spice containers and cups ), decorative elements (such as centerpieces or candelabra ) and cutlery ( cutlery = knife , fork , Spoons, dessert spoons and more special items such as fish, cake, salad, serving and carving cutlery ).

Previously, 36 place settings were assumed. In contrast, today's standard place setting assumes 12 copies. For large feasts, for example at noble courts, a multiple of this amount had to be kept. Coffee and tea services have also been part of this since the 18th century.

history

Hallmark on a silver fork made of 800 silver

Stamped on a silver fork with 90 g silver plating

Table utensils made of silver , very rarely made of gold , were already in use in Greek and Roman times, as finds of corresponding objects prove. It served to represent the aristocracy and testified to the prominent position of its owner. As spoils of war, silver objects from the Hellenistic area are said to have reached Rome as early as the second century BC.

The treasure of Boscoreale provides vivid evidence of older silverware . Two bowls appeared next to others in the Mildenhall treasure , drinking vessels in the Berthouville treasure . The Hildesheim silver find shows that such valuable objects also came to Germania . The Seuso treasure also consists of table silver .

The pieces that make up table silver were initially made by forging or forging. The antique silver goods, which emerged from around 1860, were elaborately produced using the sand molding process with subsequent manual finishing.

In the Middle Ages, silverware was viewed as a feature of sophisticated table culture and also demonstrated noble splendor. Goldsmiths met the demand of wealthy customers for table decorations especially from the time of the Renaissance . Here the experienced goldsmiths flourished and products from Augsburg ( "Augsburg silver") and later in Hanau (also Hanauer antique silver) enjoyed at the courts of Europe an excellent reputation. The treasures of the court inventory were kept in the silver chamber . However, there were also some nobles who pawned the items made of valuable silver for financial reasons. Even the financially constrained Roman German King and later Emperor Maximilian I resorted to this method in 1496. For five years, Milan received the silverware as pledge. Prussia's King Friedrich Wilhelm I regarded silverware as a precious metal reserve for times of need. After melting, coins could be minted from vessels and dishes to cover expenses.

In the 19th century, manual production was pushed into the background by industrial production in almost all cities, but the production of silverware required a more or less high proportion of manual labor, depending on the quality. The richly decorated silverware from Hanau has long claimed to be handcrafted.

Due to the industrial production, the acquisition of silverware was also possible for the upper middle class , who were based on the aristocratic model and their table manners . Family silverware was part of a valuable legacy and was passed on from generation to generation unless an economic bottleneck forced a sale.

Stamping

For the history of German silver stamps and the meaning of the various symbols, see the detailed main article on silver stamps .

properties

Density of Ag-Cu alloys

Thousandths	Density (g / cm³)
1000	10.50
970	10.44
935	10.38
925	10.36
900	10.32
835	10.20
800	10.14

See also : Silver stamp # The fineness and its testing

Silver ions have a strong bactericidal and fungicidal effect ( oligodynamy ). Alexander the Great is said to have always kept his drinking water in silver vessels for hygienic reasons.

Pure silver (Ag) was and is rarely processed by hand. It is too soft and is therefore alloyed with copper (Cu) . Because a silver alloy still shows a white silver luster up to a proportion of 50% copper, its fineness , i.e. the proportion of pure silver, is not easily recognizable, although the physical densities of the common silver alloys can be measurably differentiated.

To check the fineness, a sample was used , which was already known in antiquity: silver leaves a line with a characteristic color on a matt-cut stone, depending on the degree of alloying. The cup sample , in which some of the silver to be tested is fused with lead, provides more precise results ; the copper content is transferred to the lead alloy and the remaining silver can be weighed.

Table silver in the figurative sense

Nowadays the term is often used as a warning when selling valuable assets . In a figurative sense, it can be found more often when, for example, publicly owned companies are to be privatized . It is used similarly when a company's equity interests are sold . It is argued that table silver should not be sold without necessity because of a one-off effect. With the disposal, the liquidity is always improved by the generated proceeds and it is likely to attract profit, but the necessary cuts in expenses or costs may already be shifted into the future.

In the political field, this is the case when z. B. a municipality sells real estate and then rents the required premises from the buyer. Although a short-term income can be booked here, it is offset by permanently new expenses for the rent. Similarly, by selling property, a balanced municipal budget can be presented as a supposed political success in the short term, but in reality this is only a one-time effect which, since the "silverware" is now sold, cannot be repeated.

Collections

Silverware is collected by both public authorities and private individuals. The oldest surviving table silver set in Europe in post-Roman times was made by the Augsburg goldsmith David Altenstetter in his workshop in 1615. It was passed on in a banking family for several generations and was bought by a US collector in 2005. Selected, exhibited objects and their relevance are given below.

• In the silver chamber of the Munich residence , 3500 individual pieces of table silver from the Wittelsbach family are kept.
• In the Heidelberg Electoral Palatinate Museum , the 72-piece table silver of Electress Elisabeth Auguste from the Rococo period is on display.
• "The Hildesheim dinner service can be considered by far the most complete of the Augsburg silver services that have survived from the 18th century." The service has now been split up. One part can be seen in the Bavarian National Museum in Munich, the other in the Roemer and Pelizaeus Museum, Hildesheim.

cleaning

Unpolished table silver with silver sulfide coating

In addition to modern care products, home remedies can also help to preserve the shine of the silver cutlery. Here, "tarnished" silver cutlery can be placed in a basin of hot water, a piece of aluminum foil and soda powder. After the final drying with a cloth, the matt appearance of tarnished silver cutlery disappears. In this way, silverware can be kept clean inexpensively.

However, this process also removes the dark oxide layer in recessed ornaments, which is actually desired there so that the decorations appear clearly visible. This cleaning method should also not be used for cutlery made of other materials (e.g. handles made of wood or ivory ) as these non-metallic materials can discolour. The water should not be too hot with antique cutlery, because the blades of old knives are often attached to the handle with a putty (so-called hollow handle knife), which softens at a temperature of approx. 75 ° C.

See also

Saliera , a little salt barrel

literature

• Carl Hernmarck: The art of the European gold and silversmiths from 1450 to 1830 . Beck [ao], Munich [ao] 1978.
• Ulla Stöver: Le Couvert. History and stories about silverware. Thiemig, Munich 1975, ISBN 3-521-04058-5 .
• Bruno-Wilhelm Thiele: table and display silver of historicism from Hanau. Wasmuth, Tübingen 1992, ISBN 3-8030-5059-6 (at the same time: Mainz, University, dissertation, 1990).
• Hildegund Bemmann: Rhenish table silver. Silver pomp and table utensils of the northern Rhineland from 1550 to 1800. CMZ-Verlag, Rheinbach-Merzbach 1992, ISBN 3-87062-009-9 (At the same time: Bonn, University, dissertation, 1989: Silver pomp and table utensils of the northern Rhineland from 1550 to 1800. ).
• François Baratte: Silver dishes, culture and luxury in Roman society (= Trier Winckelmann programs. H. 15). von Zabern, Mainz 1998, ISBN 3-8053-2551-7 .
• Claudia Horbas, Renate Möller: Silver from the Renaissance to the Modern Age. (Facts, prices, trends). Deutscher Kunstverlag, Munich et al. 2000, ISBN 3-422-06283-1 .
• Johanna Gehrlein: Rose cutlery. Johanna Gehrlein, Kahl 2009, ISBN 978-3-9813273-0-4 .

Web links

Commons : silverware, silverware, silver cutlery  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Wiktionary: Silverware  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

• Table silver by Andreas Emmel for Paul Joseph Freiherr von Landsberg-Velen
• World online debate: who has silverware?
• Gerhard Müller, silverware (PDF; 98 kB)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Alexander Demandt : History of late antiquity. The Roman Empire from Diocletian to Justinian 284–565 AD 2nd, fully revised and expanded edition. Beck, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-406-57241-8 , page 330 . Queryed on January 4, 2015.
2. ^ Claudia Wölfel: Myth and political allegory on silverware from the Roman Empire. Berlin 1996, (Berlin, Free University, dissertation, 1996), introduction. Queryed on January 4, 2015.
3. ↑ B.-W.Thiele: table and display silver of historicism from Hanau. 1992.
4. ^ Johanna Gehrlein: Rose cutlery. 2009, pages 11-18.
5. ↑ B.-W.Thiele: table and display silver of historicism from Hanau. 1992, page 77: The Bebenhausen silver, made from 1896 by the company J: D. Schleissner, Hanau, for the hunting lodge of King Karl von Württemberg.
6. ↑ Ulrich Schmidt (Ed.): Historicism. Applied arts in the 19th century. Volume 3: Furniture. (= Catalog of the collection "Applied Art and Design - 1840 to Today" "in the gate guard at the Hessisches Landesmuseum. Vol. 1, 3). Staatliche Museen, Kassel 1994, ISBN 3-924259-07-0 , pages 26-27: Washing dishes (made of silver) for the Princess of Hanau, made by JDSchleissner, Hanau, around 1850.
7. ^ Hermann Wiesflecker : Austria in the age of Maximilian I. The unification of the countries to the early modern state. The rise to world power. Verlag für Geschichte und Politik, Vienna 1999, ISBN 3-7028-0363-7 , page 104.
8. ↑ Friedrich Frhr. v. Schrötter (Hrsg.): Dictionary of coinage. 2nd, unchanged edition. de Gruyter, Berlin 1970, page 220 . Queryed on January 4, 2015.
9. ↑ B.-W.Thiele: table and display silver of historicism from Hanau. 1992, page 9.
10. ↑ Conversion factors for jewelry alloys and fine metals. In: BeyArx.com. Retrieved January 3, 2020 . 
11. ^ Waldemar Ternes: Biochemistry dr elements. Inorganic chemistry of biological processes. Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg 2013, ISBN 978-3-8274-3019-9 , p. 168.
12. ^ Lillian Schacherl, Josef H. Biller: Munich (= ADAC travel guide. ). Revised edition. ADAC-Verlag, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-89905-480-6 , pages 36-37 . Queryed on January 4, 2015.
13. ^ Lorenz Selig: Catalog of the dinner service of the Hildesheim prince-bishop Friedrich Wilhelm von Westphalen. In: Manfred Boetzkes, Lorenz Seelig (Hrsg.): The princely table. The silver service of the Hildesheim prince-bishop Friedrich Wilhelm von Westphalen. (Catalog for the exhibition of the same name in the Roemer and Pelizaeus Museum, Hildesheim, from May 14 to August 14, 1995). Quensen, Lamspringe 1995, ISBN 3-922805-51-5 , pp. 95 ff.