Reference
Glossary of gold and silver terms
The trade has a word for everything and none of them is explained on the label. Here are 76 of them, each in a few plain sentences: what the marks mean, what the constructions are called, what a coin dealer is looking at, the handful of probate words an executor runs into, and the words used for each step of a sale here. Where a term has a guide of its own, the definition points to it.
No obligation. Decline and it all comes back free; ask for part of it back and a fresh offer is made for the rest.
0-9
- 9ct gold
- Gold alloy of 375 fineness, which is 9 parts gold in 24, or 37.5 per cent gold. It is the commonest UK jewellery standard and the lowest UK approved fineness for gold.
- 14ct gold
- Gold alloy of 585 fineness, which is 14 parts gold in 24. It is common in continental European and American jewellery, often stamped 585 or 14K, and is a UK approved fineness.
- 18ct gold
- Gold alloy of 750 fineness, which is 18 parts gold in 24, or 75 per cent gold. It is the usual standard for fine jewellery and is stamped 750 or 18K where it is not hallmarked.
- 22ct gold
- Gold alloy of 916 fineness, which is 22 parts gold in 24. It is used for sovereigns, Krugerrands and much South Asian and Middle Eastern jewellery. The hallmark reads 916 and the standard behind it is 916.6, while coin specifications quote 916.66 or 916.7.
- 24ct gold
- Pure gold, marked 999 or 999.9. It is too soft for most jewellery and is the standard for bullion bars and modern bullion coins such as the Britannia.
A
- Acid test (touchstone test)
- A traditional test in which an item is rubbed on a touchstone and the streak is treated with nitric-acid solutions of known strength. The reaction gives an approximate fineness. It is quick and cheap, but it leaves a small mark and cannot see beneath plating, so it sits alongside the other methods described under testing and XRF, and is used only with the owner's permission.
- Alloy
- A mixture of metals. Almost nothing made to be worn is pure: gold is alloyed with silver, copper, zinc, palladium or nickel for hardness and colour, and sterling silver is 925 parts silver to 75 parts of something else, usually copper. The fineness is the share of the alloy that is the precious metal.
- Assay
- The analysis of a metal to find out what it is made of, and in particular how much precious metal it contains. An assay may be non-destructive, as with XRF, or destructive, as with fire assay.
- Assay office
- An independent body authorised to test precious-metal articles and strike hallmarks certifying their fineness. Four operate in the UK: London, whose mark is a leopard's head; Birmingham, an anchor; Sheffield, a rose; and Edinburgh, a three-towered castle. Marks from the closed offices at Chester, Exeter, Newcastle, York and Glasgow turn up on older pieces and are perfectly genuine, and so do Irish marks from Dublin, whose office still operates.
B
- Base metal
- Any metal that is not a precious one: brass, copper, nickel, steel, zinc, pewter. Base metal turns up inside precious-metal objects all the time, as clasp springs, watch movements, knife blades, plating cores and the rods inside loaded silver, and its weight is left out rather than counted with the rest.
- Britannia coin
- A British bullion coin, and UK legal tender. The Royal Mint introduced the gold Britannia in 1987 in 22 carat gold and has struck it at 999.9 fineness since 2013, so an older Britannia is a 22 carat coin; the one-ounce coin holds one troy ounce of fine gold. Not to be confused with the Britannia mark on silver.
- Britannia silver
- Silver of 958 fineness, one of the UK approved standards, marked with the seated figure of Britannia rather than the lion passant. It is softer and purer than sterling and was compulsory for a period in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, so the mark is also an age signal.
- Bullion
- Precious metal in a form wanted for the metal itself, such as bars, ingots and coins struck for investment. Bullion is bought and sold as a known quantity, because its content is published and it can change hands without testing.
C
- Canteen
- A complete set of flatware, usually in a fitted wooden case with a compartment for each place setting. A canteen that is complete, matched, by one maker and in one pattern is worth considerably more together than the same pieces apart, which is why they should never be split before somebody has looked at them.
- Carat (ct)
- The proportion of gold in an alloy expressed in twenty-fourths, so 24ct is pure gold and 18ct is 18 parts gold in 24. The UK spells it with a c; the American karat means the same thing. The carat used for gemstone weight is a different unit altogether, equal to 0.2 g.
- Common control mark
- A mark showing a pair of balance scales, usually with the fineness in figures, struck by the assay office of a country that belongs to the International Convention on Hallmarks. Convention hallmarks from member countries are legally recognised in the UK and need not be hallmarked again here, so a piece carrying one has been independently tested even though the marks look unfamiliar.
- Continental silver
- Silver made outside the UK, often to a standard below sterling, commonly 800 or 835 parts per thousand, and marked with national marks or a bare millesimal figure rather than a UK hallmark. 800 is a UK approved standard and 835 is not, so a Dutch or German piece is identified by testing rather than by assumption.
D
- Date letter
- The letter in a hallmark that identifies the year an article was assayed. The letter style, its surrounding shield and the assay office have to be read together, because each office has run through the alphabet many times in different letter styles. Optional since 1999, so its absence says nothing about age.
- Density test (specific gravity test)
- Weighing an item in air and then suspended in water to work out its density, one of the methods described under testing and XRF. Gold and silver alloys have characteristic densities, so a result near brass on a piece whose surface reads as carat gold exposes plating or a filled core. It is unreliable on hollow, stone-set or ceramic-bonded pieces.
- Dental gold
- The gold-bearing alloy used in crowns, bridges, inlays and some denture frameworks. The recipe varies widely between dental laboratories and can only be established by testing, as the guide to testing dental gold sets out. Porcelain, tooth material and cement are left out of the weight by estimate, and stay on until an offer has been accepted.
- Duty mark
- A sovereign's head struck among the hallmarks on British silver and gold assayed between 1784 and 1890, showing that duty had been paid. Its presence brackets a piece to that period, which makes it one of the quickest age checks on an unfamiliar object.
E
- EPNS
- Electroplated nickel silver: a base-metal body of nickel silver coated with a layer of silver a few microns thick by electrolysis. Marked EPNS, EP or A1, sometimes with a row of marks laid out to resemble a hallmark. There is no silver in it worth speaking of, however handsome the piece.
- Estimate (from photographs)
- What you are told from photographs before anything is posted: what the pieces appear to be, which look plated, which deserve a specialist first, and a rough idea of whether posting is worthwhile. It is an opinion given without the items in hand, it binds neither side and it is not an offer (clause 2.1 of the terms of service).
- Exemption weight
- The weight below which an article need not be hallmarked under the Hallmarking Act 1973, one of the rules set out in the guide to reading UK hallmarks. It is 1 g for gold, 7.78 g for silver, 0.5 g for platinum and 1 g for palladium. A stud earring or a fine chain with no mark on it is therefore entirely normal.
F
- Fine weight
- The mass of pure precious metal in an item, as distinct from what the item weighs. It is how coin specifications are stated: a sovereign's standard weight under the Coinage Act 1971 is 7.98805 g, of which 7.32238 g is fine gold.
- Fineness
- The proportion of precious metal in an alloy. The UK approved finenesses are 375, 585, 750, 916, 990 and 999 for gold; 800, 925, 958 and 999 for silver; 850, 900, 950 and 999 for platinum; and 500, 950 and 999 for palladium. A hallmark certifies a minimum, so a marked piece may be a little finer.
- Fire assay
- A destructive laboratory method in which a sample is melted with fluxes and lead, then cupelled to separate the precious metal for weighing. It is the reference method for gold content and it consumes the sample. There is no arrangement with an assay laboratory here, so it is not a test that can be proposed to you; testing and XRF sets out what is used instead.
- Flatware
- Cutlery: spoons, forks, knives and serving pieces, as distinct from hollowware, which is vessels. Spoons and forks are solid and are what they weigh. Knives are not, because a sterling handle is a hollow shell around filler and a steel blade.
G
- Gold plate
- A layer of gold deposited on base metal or on silver by electrolysis, typically well under a micron to a few microns thick. Marked GP, GEP or HGE where it is marked at all. There is no recoverable gold in a plated piece; what is underneath is brass, copper or a nickel alloy.
- Gold-filled
- A base-metal core bonded with a layer of gold alloy far thicker than electroplate, usually marked with a fraction and a carat, such as 1/20 12K GF. The fraction is the share of the whole weight that is the gold layer. It is the construction most likely to read as solid carat gold on a surface test, which is why weight and density are checked too; the guide to plated, rolled and gold-filled work sets out the differences.
- Grant of probate
- The court document confirming that the executors named in a will have authority to deal with the estate. GOV.UK's guidance is that you should not make financial plans until you have got probate, which is why the guide to selling as an executor says to wait for it. The rules differ in Scotland and Northern Ireland.
- Gross weight
- The whole weight of an item as it arrives, including stones, filling, springs, blades, glass and anything else attached to it. It is recorded first, and nothing is taken off a piece before an offer for it has been accepted, so that the description of a piece starts from what actually arrived.
H
- Half sovereign
- A British 22 carat gold coin of 3.99402 g gross weight holding 3.66119 g of fine gold, exactly half a sovereign, under the Coinage Act 1971 standard. Collector interest in halves does not simply track interest in full sovereigns.
- Hallmark
- A set of marks struck by an assay office certifying that an article has been independently tested and meets an approved fineness. A full UK hallmark carries a sponsor's mark, a millesimal fineness mark and an assay office mark, and often a date letter. It says what the metal is; it says nothing about how much of it there is, what is inside the piece, or who made it. Coins are not hallmarked.
- Hollowware
- Silver vessels and containers such as teapots, coffee pots, jugs, bowls and salvers, as distinct from flatware, which is cutlery. Hollowware may be raised from sheet, loaded, or mounted on glass or ceramic, so how much silver is in it varies enormously from one form to the next.
I
- Import mark
- The mark applied by a UK assay office to an article made abroad and tested here. Between 1904 and 1998 the offices used distinct import symbols and expressed the fineness as a decimal, such as .375 or .916, in an oval or oblong. A decimal fineness in that shape therefore means a foreign-made piece assayed in Britain, not a foreign stamp.
K
- Karat
- The American spelling of carat as a measure of gold purity. 14K and 14ct are the same thing, 14 parts gold in 24, or 585 fine. It should not be confused with the carat used for gemstone weight.
- Krugerrand
- A South African bullion coin struck in 22 carat alloy, with a springbok on the reverse. The standard one-ounce coin holds one troy ounce of fine gold. Like other bullion coins it is a known unit that needs no testing, which is what separates it from jewellery.
L
- Letters of administration
- The document equivalent to a grant of probate where the person died without a will, naming the administrator who has authority to deal with the estate. GOV.UK states that where there is no will, the closest living relative can apply.
- Lion passant
- The traditional mark for sterling silver hallmarked in England, showing a lion walking with its right forepaw raised. It certifies 925 fineness, and since 1999 it has been optional beside the compulsory figure 925. Edinburgh uses a lion rampant, standing on its hind legs, for the same standard.
- Lot
- Everything you send together. It is listed and tested piece by piece, and one written offer is made for the whole of it. Items that arrive in separate parcels on different days are separate lots, unless you ask in writing for the first to be held until the second arrives (clause 3.3 of the terms of service).
- Loupe
- The small folding magnifier, usually ten times, used to read hallmarks and examine settings. A phone camera held close in side light does much the same job for photographing a mark, which is why you do not need one at home to describe what you have.
M
- Marriage (married piece)
- An object assembled from parts of two different pieces, most often a lid from one pot on the body of another. Detachable parts carry their own marks, so a lid whose marks do not match its body gives it away. It matters a great deal to a specialist and not at all to the metal.
- Millesimal fineness
- Fineness expressed in parts per thousand. A mark of 750 means 750 parts precious metal in 1,000, which is 18ct gold. Modern UK hallmarks carry the millesimal figure inside a surround whose shape says which metal it is: gold, silver, platinum and palladium each have their own.
- Mint mark
- A single small letter on a coin showing where it was struck. On a sovereign it sits on the ground line above the date on a St George reverse, or below the shield on a shield reverse. S, M, P, C, I and SA mark the overseas branch mints; no letter means the coin was struck by the Royal Mint in Britain. It is the first thing a coin dealer looks for.
N
- Nickel silver
- An alloy of copper, nickel and zinc that is silver in colour and contains no silver at all. It is the usual base beneath EPNS plating.
- Numismatic value
- What a coin is worth to collectors because of its date, mint, type, rarity or condition, over and above the metal in it. It can be many times the metal and it is destroyed the moment the coin is melted, which is the subject of the guide to selling sovereigns without losing the premium.
O
- Open market value
- The basis on which an estate's possessions are valued for inheritance tax. HMRC's Inheritance Tax Manual defines it as the price which the property might reasonably be expected to fetch if sold in the open market at that time, and the relevant time is the date of death. It is not a replacement cost and not an offer, as the executor guide explains.
P
- Palladium
- A platinum-group metal used in white-gold alloys, in jewellery of its own and in some dental alloys. The UK approved finenesses are 500, 950 and 999, and its hallmark surround is three connected ovals. Palladium hallmarking was offered from 2009 and became compulsory in 2010, so an unmarked palladium piece may simply predate it.
- Patina
- The soft, even surface an old silver object acquires over a century of light use and gentle cleaning. Specialists want it and a polishing wheel destroys it in minutes. It cannot be put back, which is why nothing old should be cleaned before somebody has looked at it.
- Pattern
- The named design of a set of flatware, such as Old English, Fiddle, King's or Queen's. A pattern people still collect and match can be sold as replacements to someone completing a service; a pattern with no following is simply cutlery.
- Platinum
- A dense white precious metal used in jewellery and some dental alloys. The UK approved finenesses are 850, 900, 950 and 999, with 950 the usual jewellery standard, and the hallmark surround is a house shape. Its weight in the hand is the giveaway: platinum is noticeably heavier than white gold of the same size.
- Proof
- A coin struck with specially prepared dies and polished blanks, for presentation or for sets, with mirrored fields and very sharp detail. Proofs were never meant to circulate, so a proof-like surface on an old coin is a reason to have it seen by a coin specialist before it is sold anywhere.
- Provenance
- Where a piece came from and how that can be shown: who owned it, how it was acquired, and what paperwork exists. It matters twice over. A buyer has to establish that a seller is entitled to sell, as the guide to identity and provenance checks sets out, and a documented history can add real interest to a collectable piece.
- Pseudo-hallmark
- A row of marks on plated ware laid out to resemble a hallmark, using shields, animals or letters that are not assay office marks. They are not assay marks, and most were a maker's house style rather than a forgery, but they were made to look like a hallmark and they catch people out constantly. A genuine UK hallmark always includes an assay office mark, which is the first thing to look for.
R
- Refining
- The industrial process of melting scrap and separating the precious metal from base metals to a high purity. It cannot be undone, which is why anything that may be worth more intact is set aside and pointed out before it goes anywhere near it.
- Rhodium plating
- A very thin coating of rhodium, itself a platinum-group metal, applied to white gold to make it whiter and brighter. It wears through first at the shank of a ring, which is why a worn white-gold ring often looks faintly yellow underneath. It is a coating on a solid carat piece, not a plated construction.
- Rolled gold
- A sheet of gold alloy bonded to a base-metal core and rolled thin, used for watch cases, pens, spectacle frames and inexpensive jewellery. Marked RG, rolled gold, plaqué or doublé. Thicker and longer-wearing than plating, and still not solid gold; rolled gold, gold-filled and vermeil compared sets out the differences.
- Rose gold
- A gold alloy with a high copper content, which gives the pink colour. The colour says nothing about fineness. Rose gold exists at 9ct, 14ct and 18ct and is identified by its mark and its test like any other alloy.
S
- Scrap
- Precious-metal items sold for the metal in them rather than as objects. The Scrap Metal Dealers Act 2013, which applies in England and Wales, excludes gold, silver and any alloy of which two per cent or more by weight is gold or silver from its definition of scrap metal, so the rules governing a gold buyer are not those governing a scrap-metal yard.
- Sheffield plate
- Fused plate, made from about 1742 by bonding sheet silver to a copper ingot and rolling the two together, before electroplating replaced it in the 1840s. Worn Sheffield plate shows copper coming through, warm rather than grey. It holds no silver worth recovering as metal, and old pieces are collected in their own right.
- Signed piece
- Jewellery carrying a maker's or designer's name, meant to be read as a word rather than as initials in a shield. A signature is not a sponsor's mark. It is one of the four clearest signals that a piece may be worth more intact, and the guide to what to have looked at explains where to find one.
- Silver plate
- A base metal, usually nickel silver or copper, carrying a thin layer of silver. It covers EPNS and the older fused Sheffield plate, and neither holds silver worth recovering as metal.
- Solder
- The lower-melting alloy used to join the parts of a piece. Gold solder is usually of lower fineness than the item it joins, and lead-solder repairs on silver contaminate the metal. A test spot that lands on a joint reports the solder rather than the piece, which is why readings are taken in more than one place.
- Sovereign
- A British 22 carat gold coin with a standard weight of 7.98805 g at 916.66 fineness under the Coinage Act 1971, holding 7.32238 g of fine gold; The Royal Mint quotes it rounded as 7.98 g at 916.7. Its date, portrait, reverse type and mint mark are what a specialist reads, as the guide to sovereign premiums explains.
- Specific gravity
- The density of a material relative to water. Pure gold is about 19.3, a typical 9ct alloy around 11, sterling silver about 10.3 and brass around 8.5, so the figure separates solid carat gold from a plated or filled piece that reads the same on the surface.
- Sponsor's mark (maker's mark)
- The registered initials of the person or firm that submitted an article for hallmarking, struck in a distinctive shield. It names whoever was responsible for the article, which is not always who made it. On antique silver it is the mark that identifies a recognised maker.
- Sterling silver
- Silver of 925 fineness, which is 925 parts silver in 1,000 with the remainder usually copper. It is the standard UK silver alloy, marked with the figure 925 in an oval and, traditionally, the lion passant in England. A bare 925 with no assay office mark is a manufacturer's claim rather than a tested one.
T
- Troy ounce
- The unit precious metals are weighed in, a little over 31 g. It is heavier than the 28.35 g avoirdupois ounce used for food, which is why a one-ounce coin weighs more than an ounce of anything in a kitchen.
V
- Vermeil
- Sterling or fine silver with a layer of gold over it. The body is a precious metal and the gilding is decoration, so vermeil is silver and is treated as silver. Where it is hallmarked, the hallmark is a silver one, and it can be hidden under the gold; the guide to vermeil and other gold coatings explains what to look for.
W
- Weighted (loaded) silver
- Silverware, typically candlesticks, trophy bases, shakers and dressing-table pieces, made from thin silver sheet over a filling of pitch, plaster, cement or resin, usually around a steel rod. The hallmark is real and certifies the sheet. What the piece weighs says almost nothing about the silver in it, as the guide to weighted and loaded silver describes.
- White gold
- A gold alloy whitened with palladium, nickel or silver, nearly always rhodium plated for brightness. It is identified by its gold fineness like any other alloy. The rhodium is a coating and can affect a surface reading, so a worn spot is the place to test.
- Written offer
- The single amount offered for a whole lot, sent in writing once the items have arrived and been listed, weighed and tested, with every item described on it. Nothing is sold until you accept it deliberately, and silence is never acceptance. Decline it and everything comes back free; ask for some pieces back and you get a fresh offer for the rest while the first stays open (clauses 5.1 and 6.1 to 6.3 of the terms of service).
X
- XRF (X-ray fluorescence)
- A non-destructive method in which an item is exposed to X-rays and the elements present are identified from the energies they give off. Handheld and benchtop instruments read near-surface composition, roughly the outer fifteen to twenty microns of a gold alloy, and readings are affected by plating, surface enrichment, solder, curvature, small or thin samples, contamination and mixed construction. The guide to the limits of an XRF reading takes each in turn.
Y
- Yellow gold
- Gold alloyed with silver and copper in proportions that keep the natural colour. As with rose and white gold, the colour is independent of fineness, and a 9ct piece and a 22ct piece can look much the same across a room.
Not sure what you have? Start with photographs.
Photograph the lot: the tangled chains, the single earrings, the canteen nobody uses, the bits you cannot identify. Send it over and you get a rough idea back, with no pressure of any kind. Post it afterwards if you want to, or do not.
Nothing is sold until you say yes. Decline and it all comes back by tracked post, free; ask for part of it back and a fresh offer is made for the rest.
If a piece is worth more than its metal
A signed brooch, a date-run sovereign, a watch that still runs, a piece of early silver: anything that looks worth more whole is flagged to you before it is treated as metal, and you can take it back at that point.