My First Trefid and a Ramble About Teaspoons

Three teaspoons came in the mail for me Friday, and here they are, fresh out of their packaging:

Left to right: Britannia standard rattail teaspoon, maker's mark HI (more about that below), London; rattail teaspoon, Jeremiah Lee, London; trefid teaspoon, John Clifton, London

Close ups of engravings and hallmarks

The trefid teaspoon is my first 17th century spoon, and I have to say, I like it.  The little teaspoon has a nice weight and feel to and the reeded rattail is a nice detail.  I also like the flat stem.  When seen next to the other teaspoons I have, it really does have a more primitive - but charming - look.  The spoon measures 10.5 cm in length and the maker appears to be John Clifton.   You can see a sweet set of engraved spoons and forks by John Clifton for sale by Peter Cameron here.  Fully-marked early teaspoons are very rare, and one by John Clifton was sold in 2010 by Woolley and Wallis. 

The two Hanoverian rattail teaspoons are fantastic.  I am a big fan of coats of arms on flatware, and didn't yet have a teaspoon so engraved, so was happy to see this one show up in the most recent Finial auction.  I believe the coat of arms belongs to the Dalton family (Burke, 522-523).  It is marked with the lion's head erased and a maker's mark of HI.  A quick search of Jackson's Silver & Gold Marks turns up three contenders for the maker: Edmund Hickman (169), William Hinton (161), and Samuel Hitchcock (164).  Without seeing the shape of the punch, it is too difficult to make a firm attribution.  This teaspoon measures 12.2 cm.

The teaspoon with the engraved cypher is also a Finial find.  This spoon is by Jeremiah Lee and measures 11.8 cm.  The teaspoon was dated to circa 1740, so I can only assume that, since the rattail had given way to the drop by this point, the teaspoon might have been made to match a set of existing older rattail teaspoons.  Baffling and frustrating, cyphers are nonetheless intriguing.  My best guess is that the letters on this teaspoon are "I/J V."  Of course, I could be completely wrong.

Here is a photograph of the teaspoons in my collection:

To state the obvious, the teaspoon on the left is clearly the longest, with the next three being roughly the same size, followed by the two smallest on the far right  The ratio of bowl length to overall spoon length of the second spoon from the left is the largest out the teaspoons.  Excluding the trefid teaspoon, the shape of the Hanoverian terminals on the spoons is the same, except for the spoon located third from the right, which has a more squared off terminal.  Dare I say that early teaspoons are like snow flakes: no two are alike?

Michael Clayton, in the "Queen Anne and George I" section of his Christie's Pictorial History of English and American Silver (102) notes, while discussing the appearance of the teaspoon, that "[i]n Scotland spoons were numbered so that the lady of the house could return the correct cup and saucer to its owner on refilling."  What a neat system.  Schredds sold a set of numbered dognose teaspoons, which are attributed to Joseph Barbut of London.  Were the owners of these teaspoons Scottish?  Or did the English also sometimes number their teaspoons?

Sources:
Burke, John Esq.. A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Landed Gentry; or Commoners of Great Britain 
       and Ireland, etc. Vol I. London: Henry Colburn, 1837: 522-523. Google Books. Web. 3 Feb 2014.
Clayton, Michael. Christie's Pictorial History of English and American Silver.
       Oxford: Phaidon Christie's Limited, 1985. Print.
Pickford, Ian, ed. Jackson's Silver & Gold Marks of England, Scotland & Ireland. 3rd ed., 1989. Woodbridge: 
       The Antique Collectors' Club, Ltd., 2011. Print.