Solid Silver?

[nikita**]

How can I tell that the silver jewellery given to me is solid silver? I cannot see any hallmarks of any sort. What should I be looking for to determine this?

[Buenchico]

It's illegal to sell jewellery in this country as 'silver' unless there's a hallmark to verify the description. If you've been given an item without a hallmark then either:
(a) the item should not have been described as 'silver' when it was sold (even though it could actually have some silver content); or
(b) the item was purchased abroad.

In either case, there's no simple way to test the silver content of the item without laboratory testing.

Incidentally, even if the item was hallmarked as Sterling silver, it still wouldn't be 'solid' silver. Sterling silver only contains 92.5% silver. The rest is usually copper.

Anyway, whatever happened to the saying 'It's the thought that counts' ? :-)

Chris

[DaSwede]

Hi nikita, I'm thinking that you want to avoid nickel (etcetera) allergy, yes? Here in Sweden they sell some stuff (liquid, I believe) at the pharmacy that you can test your jewellery with, for allergy purposes. Perhaps they have it where you live, too.

[nikita**]

Thanks / : - )

[PhilBy]

All silver sold without a hall mark must be described as 'Continal Silver' (This does not necessarily mean it is low grade)

Any half decent Jeweller / Pawn Broker will have a kit that can test it within seconds :-)

[candybar]

do you know what a hallmark is? what mark you should even be looking for? it is normally so small, and you wouldnt pick it out as anything important unless you were looking for it :)

[MrCrip]

I have been caught out before with hall-marked jewellery. It does come back to the old saying 'You get what you pay for'.

I only buy jewellery from selected stores, when it comes to silver jewellery I get everything from http://www.zoojewellery.com

They are a UK based company with shops in the South East of England. They are friendly and have a great range and rather surprisingly they have a good website as well.