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 SMP Silver Salon Forums
 Continental / International Silver
 russian silver assayer O.C over 1895
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| Author | Topic: russian silver assayer O.C over 1895 |
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mark77 Posts: 35 |
posted 07-11-2007 04:25 PM
  
can anyone identify the name of the silver assayer o.c from minsk? (according to postnikova-lesova's book on russian hallmarks) the marks are located in two places on a yad, or torah pointer. perhaps some collector of russian silver or judaica would be able to inform me. there was no maker's mark on the yad. i thank you all in advance for your consideration. sincerely,mark77 IP: Logged |
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blakstone Posts: 493 |
posted 07-11-2007 04:32 PM
That would be Josef Sosnkowski of Warsaw, now Minsk. (This is an error in Postnikova-Lesova.) See this thread for more information; scroll down to the long entry about Warsaw silversmiths. A word of caution, though; there are many, many reproductions of these Judaica pieces on the market, complete with fake Russo-Polish marks. IP: Logged |
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mark77 Posts: 35 |
posted 07-11-2007 05:02 PM
blakstone, thank you so much for your speedy reply and connecting thread to all that info. so, my yad's assayor was from warsaw, not minsk, and his names was josef sosnkowski. i am now a little troubled with your assertion that many judaica pieces were fakedly marked. How can i ascertain whether my yad is original or having spurious marks? i thank you once again. sincerely, mark77 IP: Logged |
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blakstone Posts: 493 |
posted 07-12-2007 12:29 AM
Again, from the archives, here's a useful thread on fake Russian silver. I hate to say it, but quite frankly, so prolific is fraudulent Russian silver Judaica that when I come across it, I start with the assumption that it is fake and proceed from there. The OC/1895 Warsaw assayer's mark is, unfortunately, one of the most commonly faked, generally appearing on clumsily made items characterized by one or more cut-and-applied stars of David, ropework banding, collet set faux cabochon gems and/or (poorly) enameled porcelain plaques. These almost never have a maker's mark, and the fake "Warsaw" mark is - with practice - immediately recognizable. Caveat emptor. (Especially on online auction sites -- wink, wink, nugde, nudge, say no more.) IP: Logged |
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mark77 Posts: 35 |
posted 07-12-2007 03:41 PM
thanks for your reply, although the info you imparted was less than heartening. i don't consider the yad i bought as clumsily made, but i don't have the knowledge/experience to compare it with others, aside from a few pics on ebay. can you give me your opinion that even if it is a fake, it is at least made of 875 fine silver? also, one reason why a maker's name or mark is missing may be the fact that it was used in synagogue while reading the torah. again this is just a hypothesis of mine. do you know if other yads had a maker's mark? thanks for the thread to the dialogue on false russian hallmarks, especially on judaica. why is it your experience that objects stamped O.C over 1895 are often fakes? my yad has an 84 with some mark i can't make out to the right. to further complicate this matter for me, tardy's book on international hallmarks on silver shows a minsk assayer's mark of O.C over 1874. thanks once again for your info; i look forward to hearing from you again. sincerely, mark77 IP: Logged |
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blakstone Posts: 493 |
posted 07-12-2007 05:52 PM
Tardy's information was taken from Postnikova-Lesova and thus repeats her error. The Minsk and Warsaw marks were virtually identical, but the assayer O.C. - Josef Sosnkowski - was only in Warsaw. It is not uncommon for western European religious items to be missing the maker's mark, but this is not generally true of Russian items. However, my point was that the "OC/1895" fakes generally do not have one. Likewise, I did not intend to suggest that the fakes I'm talking about are not (.800 or higher) silver - they usually are - only that they are of recent, not Tsarist-era, manufacture. I really don't like being the bearer of bad news, but, like you, my doubts about the authenticity of your piece continues to grow. "Clumsy" is of course in the eye of the beholder, but remember that true devotional items were both valuable and held in great esteem, and this reverence was reflected in their manufacture. Any inattention to detail or incomplete finishing should ring alarm bells. (Some even have "rabbinical" figures that are little more than offensive caricatures yet - astonishingly - are consistently sold as genuine.) I can only suggest that you try searching popular online auction sites for "Russian", "Silver" and "Judaica". I assure you that most of what you find is fake, and that you will very, very quickly see a similarity of style and hallmarks among them. If your piece seems to fit the same pattern, then, well . . . consider it a valuable (though I hope not expensive) lesson learned. I myself have a lovely 18th century Neapolitan dish from 20th century Mexico. IP: Logged |
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mark77 Posts: 35 |
posted 07-13-2007 06:14 PM
thank you once again for your info. my piece has a cast lion of judah above a finely pierced demi-sphere of flowers and leaves, so i don't think the workmanship is shoddy. the bottom hand part has a ring (missing stone,) and the other fingers curled under the palm show the fingernails, so i don't think lack of attention to detail is a problem either. i am pleased you believe the majority of fakes were made of at least 800 silver. i would be very disappointed to learn it was only silver-plated. in any case, i am pleased with my (relatively inexpensive) purchase; if the marks are genuine or pseudo no longer concerns me. i plan to replace the missing stones (perhaps with eilat stone from israel) and enjoy the piece on my coffee table. thank you once again for all your help. sincerely, mark77 IP: Logged |
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DB Posts: 252 |
posted 07-13-2007 08:21 PM
I also have the Russian L/P book and find it so annoying that one always has to find a translator. So recently I found a book of Russian master - and assay master's marks, which is very comprehensive - Geoffrey Watts: Russian Silversmiths' Hallmarks 1700 to 1917, Gemini Publications, Bath 2006 and on page 84 is shows two assay master marks O.C. above 1879 for an unknown master 1847-1895 Minsk, and another O.C. above 1875 for an unknown master 1875-1886 St. Petersburg. If Mr. Watts repeats the Losseva mistakes I can't say, but this new book is a good tool for the non-russian speakers and readers. IP: Logged |
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IJP Posts: 326 |
posted 07-14-2007 07:18 PM
I'll definitely have to check out that English-language reference, Ms. Burstyn. A few errors aside, I'm happy to use the Russian-language Postnikova-Loseva text, but it never hurts to have other sources. blakstone, a quick question, more a matter of orthography than of silver: You explained in your referenced thread that Josef Sosnkowski used several marks, among them IS (Latin), IC (Cyrillic), and OC (Cyrillic). In Polish, the initial palatalized "y" sound (which starts the Polish and Russian pronunciation of the name) may be represented by I, (and often И in Russian), but I still don't understand how OC can possibly (and sensibly) represent a Josef S... How did the scholars in this field come to the conclusion that OC should designate Sosnkowski, despite what appears to be a glaring contradiction in the letters themselves? Perhaps there is a simple explanation for that, but I can't imagine it. Help me understand. IP: Logged |
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blakstone Posts: 493 |
posted 07-15-2007 12:25 AM
Watts' book is very handy if you don't want to slog your way through translating the Russian, but it is derived almost entirely from P/L (which has more biographical information) and therefore once again repeats the errors there regarding Warsaw & Minsk assayers. The information regarding Warsaw assayers in my linked thread is from two sources: 1) Michal Gradowski's Znaki na Srebreze (Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN, 2001), which is pretty much the "bible" for Polish city & assayer's marks (no maker's marks, although the same author has since published a separate volume of these for former Prussian Poland and more volumes are planned), and 2) Ryszard Bobrow's Srebra Warszawskie 1851-1939 (Warsaw: Muzeum Narodowe w Warszawie, 1997), the catalogue of an exhibit of Tsarist-era Warsaw silver at the Warsaw National Museum. The information in these works is taken from primary sources in Warsaw, so there are no conclusions to be drawn; Josef Sosnkowski's long tenure as chief assayer in Warsaw is well-documented in the records there. The "OC" assayer's mark which appears exclusively alongside the many Warsaw maker's marks from 1870 is unquestionably his. Gradowski notes that the "O" was from "Osip", a colloquial variant of "Iosef" (such as was used by Warsaw-born poet Osip Mandelstam). [This message has been edited by blakstone (edited 07-15-2007).] IP: Logged |
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IJP Posts: 326 |
posted 07-16-2007 10:12 PM
blakstone: Got it. That's all the explanation I needed, and it makes sense to me. IP: Logged |
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