| USEFUL LINKS |
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are many websites providing information on porcelain and pottery. We have
selected just a few here that we hope that you will find beneficial.
Obviously any marks on the base of an item assist considerably in identifying both the manufacturer and also the date of the piece. However, beware that early marks were sometimes copied by other makers so that even a mark is not always a sure method of confirming the origin of any particular piece particularly if it was made before about 1830. Also a lot of Staffordshire creamware and some porcelain was simply just not marked. There is an excellent book on the subject which contains almost all the British Pottery and Porcelain marks ever used and is an invaluable work of reference. It is rather expensive but is incredibly useful: Encyclopædia
of British Pottery and Porcelain Marks. Also, a very good website that lists many of the more commonly used marks and also contains a considerable amount of other useful information. Most of the main potteries and museums also have good websites that can be remarkably useful for background and historical information. We have provided just a short selection here of some of the better ones. A very useful source for general information on the the major Staffordshire potteries, the manufacture of ceramics in general and some excellent photographs is: A number of the museums with large collections of glass, pottery and porcelain have websites and these can provide some very useful historical information. There are far too many to list here and some of them are not particularly informative or well constructed. I have selected two that contain some very interesting historical information. www.spode.co.uk/history/museum.html Finally the BBC Antiques website contains some very interesting information and covers all aspects of antiques. The one word of warning if you are looking at the value of individual pieces remember that many of them were valued on the programme up to 5 years ago. Be mindful of the fact that you are not necessarily looking at a valid price for today. A very useful site providing all the main silver hallmarks and allows for easy dating of all British hallmarked silver is: Website by:- Scottweb Design Tel. 01638 552820
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