Silverware Ecclesiastical pieces made of silver or silver-gilt are candle-sticks, censers, incense boats, chalices and patens, pyxes, monstrances, bells, crosses, croziers, acolyte standards bearing candles, ewers, cruets, alms dishes, ablution bowls. The chalice is composed of a bowl (usually hemispherical or slightly elongated), a stem having, half way down, a °knopn or protuberance, and a flaring foot. While the bowl is nearly always plain (so as to be easily kept clean), the rest of the piece is elaborately ornamental. In the Protest ant Church the communion cup takes the place of the chalice. It is frequently chalice-shaped but more often has the form of a goblet, a tankard or a beaker. The flagons, tankards and beakers found in church plate have fre quently been made for profane use, but as articles of beauty and value have been dedi cated by will to the Church.
Municipal Plate.— Every, guild (from gold smiths' to tinsmiths') in Europe has its treas ure of plate which is displayed on the table at ban quets and other civic functions. And the large amount and high quality of the ware found even in obscure towns is often a surprise to the stranger; such property is, however, usually the accumulation of centuries of presents made by the wealthy in each generation. Every town hall (Rathshaus or hotel de ville) has a large array of plate services as well as magnificent show pieces. The colleges pride themselves on their great silver andgold services.
Domestic Plate.— Chief pieces used in the last centuries in circles are ewers, beakers, bowls, candle cups, cruet stands, flagons, hanaps, tankards, monteiths and other punch-bowls, urns, salvers, posnets, trussing cups, porringers, tumblers, goblets, wager cups, tasters, etc. Earliest forms of coffee pots date from 1670 to 1681 earliest teapots date from 1717; to such services belong, later, creamers, milk pitchers and sugar bowls. Forks at first had two prongs and were used only for eating fruit ; the four-pronged fork came into use first in 1682. Silver spoons of a highly artistic form (ekeel and disk')) were made in Greco-Roman times. In the study of spoons in the centuries the style of aknops or finial of the handle defines the period, besides the changing in shape of the bowl. As to these knop styles, we read in 1446 already of the °maidenhead* spoon; other varieties follow: Acorn, diamond point, fruitlet, writhen, strawberry, death's head, slipped-in-the-stalk, Puritan, scallop-shell, owl, lion-and-shield, Pudsey, seal-top, capital, baluster, pied-de-biche, etc. The 17th century
spoon handle was joined to the bowl in a di minishing prolongation down the back of the bowl; this is known as the 'rat-tail' spoon. Early spoon bowls run to °fig-shape," then oval, then inclining to be pointed at lower end. Greatly prized of collectors are the souvenir birth-spoons termed °Apostle° spoons, each ded not known; first mention is in 1537. The 'an nual letter° alphabet has but 20 letters — J, U, \\', X, Y, Z are omitted. Since 1560 they have been enclosed in regular heraldic shields of vari ous shapes; before then a line roughly outlining the letter was used. The change to another style alphabet has proceeded regularly every 20 years from 1478 till 1696, when a fresh alpha bet was used. (4) Place-mark of assay town. (5) Maker's mark — enforced, in England, since 1363 required each silversmith to have a mark of his own. Symbols, emblems or initials were used at first; from 1697 to 1720 the first letter of the surname was used alone, but from the latter date to 1739 one or two initials were used indiscriminately. Then the 'initials of their icated and having as finial a representation of one of the apostles. Actual pieces of art, fre quently are the nefs (formed, like ships), epergnes, standing salts (hour-glass salts, cyl indrical salts, bell salts, steeple salts, napkin salts, etc.).
°Hallo and Other very import ant feature to collectors of silverware is the fact that all of it is marked since the 14th cen tury by law. In 1313 Philippe le Bel, king of France, ordered that all gold be stamped with the punch (poincon) of the Goldsmiths' Com pany of Paris. The Itouche de Paris' in this law became the recognized English standard for sterling silver. Edward I, in 1300, had be stowed the privilege of assaying the precious metals to the London Goldsmiths' Company. Punch marks used on English plate are: (1) Standard— a lion passant in England, a lion rampant in Glasgow, a thistle in Edinburgh, a crowned harp in Dublin. (2) Duty mark— head of reigning sovereign (figure of Hibernia in Dublin). Thig mark was added in 1874 till 1890, when duties were abolished. (3) Date letter (or °annuaP letter). Its starting point is Christian and surnames' was ordered and con tinued to this day. In 1675 the law enforced that °all manner of silver vessels be assayed at Goldsmiths' Hall° and be approved by striking each piece with the lion's and leopard's head, crowned, or one of them. From 1697 to 1720 the lion's head erazed and Britannia were used instead of lion's head and lion passant.