Everything relating to the commercial usage of silver in the making of fine cutlery, tableware, and hollowware is referred to as the silver trade or silver manufacture. This has been a flourishing profession dating back into the Stone Age and to the great ancient religious rulers and Ptolemies in Egypt, and the Incas and Aztecs in South America. Much of the needed silver, however, has been obtained or imported through the primary functions of colonization and warfare.
While the exact beginning time for the use of the “good” or “fine” grade of silver in the minimal metallic parts content military insignia is not definite, there is general acceptance that its development and use as a distinct type began in Germany during the early part of World War II. The corresponding chemically enhanced silver-colored brass, which replaced fine silver in the manufacture of insignia during the conflict, is familiarly known under the extended titles of “German silver”. Currently, it is used in legislation of the United States Congress and government contract specifications.
This appropriate reference name is certainly due to the wartime German uniform and headgear insignia and accouterments, which were copied in every facet during the war by all of the Allied nations and thus extensively over-stamped as a method of permanent recognition or assurance of authenticity.
Background and Historical Context
The Third Reich had as one of its aims an almost complete self-sufficiency in gold. The ability to produce this money standard without being dependent on forces outside the country could compete favorably with national self-sufficiency in many other strategic metal production programs. The German silver development has followed a pattern set in the U.S.A. An alloy has been produced which, though its shortage would greatly impair the national war machine, brings beautiful objects to adorn the homes of the Reich with only a minimum of strategic drawback.
The family’s gold treasure has been kept intact and the acquisition of gold from other sources discouraged rather than completely abandoned. The proof is in the temples and palaces of worship and the fine homes and castles of National Socialism. Furthermore, the combination of the intrinsic value of fine silver and the beautiful white metal had added a small, but significant, amount of Germany’s money standard on which the paper budgets could be legislated.
The production of fine silver articles has continued in larger cities, and the demand has remained sufficient to support exchange, jewelry, and antique markets. The ability to substitute, to some extent, the abundant pedestal materials for the white metal, which seems about to approach a critical status in time of war, makes the compound somewhat distasteful to metalworkers in America at present.
However, if sufficient refining processes were to be perfected, and marketing and legislative means were to be used to encourage the use of such a man-made substitute, there is a possibility that it could sometimes become more desirable than fine silver for objects of little sentimental or historical value, but which are loved for their cloth of beauty and their rapture of design.
