While all the facts concerning the marking of old pewter should be diligently studied by the collector, as he gathers them from this source and from that, and will prove of great help, be of interest, and lend zest to collecting, one must not forget that much imitation old pewter has been fabricated with intent to defraud. However, such “fakes” (many of them are very attractive!) usually unblushingly bear upon them the ear-marks of their spurious nature, and the collector soon comes to have command of the knowledge necessary to detect such reproductions. The material of old pewter is variously compounded. Old fine pewter consisted of 112 pounds of tin to 26 pounds of copper, or--in place of the cooper--of brass. Again, a fine, hard resonant metal was made of 100 parts of tin to 17 of antimony. Distinguished from the fine pewter was common pewter--or “trifle” pewter, as it was called. This was made of 83 parts of tin to 17 parts of antimony, or, with slight variations, of 82 parts of tin to 18 parts of antimony. These various alloys are susceptible of a high polish and of retaining it well in ordinary circumstances some time. This pewter, too, has a good measure of hardness and possesses durability. Britannia metal must not be confused, as often it is, with the real pewter. It was a late eighteenth-century invention of tin, antimony, copper, and zinc, which lent itself to fashioning on the lathe (a process called “spinning”), having in this respect a decided advantage over the less easily worked pewter. Naturally it did not take long for the new Britannia metal to supersede pewter when it was discovered that Britannia metal could be electroplated. However, the general use to which pottery and porcelain, tinware and enamel attained had come to have much, too, to do with banishing pewter from general use, though it remained longer in favor in Scotland than in England. “A whole garnish of peutre,” such as a lady of 1487 bequeathed to one of her heirs, no longer came to be deemed fashionable. The master pewterers suffered and, as time went on, found themselves forced out of their trade.