INTRODUCTION
This is the first of a series of articles dealing with British hallmarks. Each article will be focused on a specific cycle of British hallmarks, not taken in a chronological order, beginning from the London Assay Office.
At the London Assay Office, each series refers to 20 years, starting with the date letter "a" and ending with the date letter "u" or "v". Only twenty letters of the alphabet have been used, excluding: j, v (or u), w, x, y and z. Note that the last letter of each cycle can be an "u" or a "v", but this is probably due to the fact that in the classic Latin language and alphabet there was no difference between "u" and "v". There is only an exception in the 18th century, prior the introduction of the Britannia standard (1696) (note 1 ), when the cycle lasted 19 years and ended with the letter "t". Also the next cycle (from 1697 onward) lasted 19 years, but in this case all the 20 date letters have been used.
Each article will present real hallmarks stuck on wrought silver plate of the current standard (sterling, 925/1000 and/or Britannia, 958.4/1000).
Although the procedure followed from time to time on hallmarking the silver objects is not the scope of these articles, I will present and comment, for the same date letter, different examples of actual hallmarks as found on various items.
Details on the British hallmarking system, including the meaning of each hallmark struck on wrought plate are available at
http://www.argentinglesi.com/marchi-garanziaing.php
while facsimile of British hallmarks can be found at
http://www.silvercollection.it/englishsilverhallmarks.html

In the following tables are presented several examples of the XVI cycle of London Hallmarks. This cycle begins with a small Roman "a" as date letter for 1776/1777 and ends with a small Roman "u" for 1795/1796 (note 2).
The punch enclosing the date letter is a shield with a pointed base with chamfered upper corners (clipped off), but occasionally it can be found with a rounded base. According to Jackson, date letters "f" and "k" are usually found in a shield with pointed base, date letters "g", and "h" are present in a shield with rounded base; date letter "i" has been found only in a rounded base shield, while all the other date letters are contained only in a pointed base shield. The examples reported below show many examples of date letters found in both variants of the shield. Furthermore, it seems that the round base shield was preferably struck when the leopard head mark was omitted. This practise is documented since the last years of the 18th century until about 1810. During this period the London town marks (the crowned leopard head) was often omitted on small items like teaspoons, condiment spoons, sugar tongs, etc., probably to contrast the practice of duty dodging (see David McKinley article The Background To "Duty Dodgers"). The leopard head is usually omitted on detachable parts of some items like tea pots, coffee pots and little baskets belonging to epergnes. Since 1810, to contrast the practice of duty dodging, hallmarks on flatware were usually struck at the top of the stem (apart for decorated patterns), with the lion passant put at 90° with respect to the other marks.

Jackson reports that the lion passant is enclosed in a punch similar to that of the date letter, with the upper corners rounded or clipped off. Actually, in some of the examples illustrated below the lion passant is enclosed in an oval stamp. Examining these examples, the conclusion is that, possibly, the oval stamp was preferably used when the leopard head mark was omitted.

The leopard head is enclosed in a plain oblong punch with rounded base and upper corners clipped off. Jackson reports the 1776 mark exception, where the corners are not chamfered. From the reported examples this assumption is not completely evident.
At this time the lion passant is "guardant" and the leopard head is crowned.

This cycle is characterised by the introduction of the duty mark on 1 December, 1784 (it will remain in use until 30 April, 1890). The mark (the head of the reigning sovereign in profile as it appeared on contemporary coins) was struck on gold and silver plate items assayed in England and Scotland (note 3 , with the exception of a limited number of small articles. From 1 December, 1784, until 28 May, 1786, the head of George III was not in cameo, as it afterwards was, but in intaglio (the die sinker had engraved the punch as the mark was required to appear in the silver). When the punch was struck on the silver piece the sovereign profile appeared sunk and reversed. The head, incuse, looking to the left appears with the date-letter "i" for 1784/5 and "k" for 1785/6, after which it is always in cameo (looking to the right until the reign of Queen Victoria) as on the coins of the period. The intaglio head is in an oblong stamp with the corners clipped off, but from 1786 the stamp was oval. As the duty mark was not struck before 1 December, 1784, and the date letters were changed on 29 May of that year, until this date the letter "i" was struck without the duty mark and afterwards was accompanied with the duty mark. A duty draw-back mark (the incuse standing figure of the Britannia) was used between 2 December 1784 and 24 July 1785 on exported piece - allowing the maker to "draw back" the duty paid. The duty drawback mark is very rare to find.

The introductory page of this article, dealing with "Determining the date on London Assay Office Marks - 1776-1795" was published in December 2010 Newsletter click here