Featured silver and amber Bracelet, Poland.

Long time no show...sorry, hope everyone on this forum is safe and their families also.

Picked-up this nice silver " Art nouveau" revival Bracelet with a nice piece of Bursztyn ( amber in Polish).
The amber is opaque and not very polished, no pun intended and is roughly 30MM x 20MM X 15MM. very nice patterns of inclusions under a strong light.
Most likely made in Poland during the communist era, there are no hallmarks besides a 925 on the band in a small rectangle.
Still not sure when what the period would be, if anyone could chime in...please do.

 

What makes you ascribe it to that era? Soviet period jewellery I have seen tends to be sort of clunky & marked with a very heavy hand. This is much more delicate, with no mark.

 

Yes i do get that Bronwen on the more mass produced stuff, bracelets like these were made around the baltic countries like Estonia, Lithuania, Poland, despite the fact that these countries were brought under communism after WWII, craftsmen did not change the way they had been making jewelry just because the country was forced into a change of political powers.
It could be older also, perhaps not Art Nouveau revival, and maybe not Polish alos, the Polish hallmarks for silver have the head of a women in a scarf since 1920 with a numeral to indicate purity level.
This one has 925 in a small rectangle, nothing else i could find on it....to small to snap on a picture.

 

I'm not familiar with styles from that area.
In the US we can date a lot of things by the clasp. I notice your bracelet has one. Could you take a close up picture of it. Maybe someone familiar with jewelry from that area might get a clue from that.

 

Oh and I forgot to say that is a really lovely bracelet. Something I would keep and wear. Any special ladies in your family?

 

Beautiful.I love the delicate surround almost more than the Amber!.

 

Yes for sure, My wife will wear it, she is Polish and already has a lot of Amber Jewelry, like the fine flowing lines of this composition hence the purchase, not a bargain but did not pay that much either ( 65 U.S ).

 

It is gorgeous, Nick. The Polish love their amber and their Art Nouveau style, and kept making AN style jewellery ever since the period, with only slight changes in their choice of designs.
This is an example of the fairly recent Polish 'Art Nouveau' style, very delicate small leaves on the usual Polish bracelet frame.
The clasp is of a type used for these Polish bracelets. All my Polish bracelets have that frame and clasp.

925 indicates that it is definitely not Communist era, but pretty recent. No silver would have been allowed to leave a Polish shop in the Communist era without the proper assay marks.
Besides, they have only recently begun to use .925 fineness, for international trade. From 1920-1963 the highest fineness was .940, after 1963 it was .916.

 

Poland was never Soviet. They have a jewellery style that was influenced by Central and Western European styles, notably the Art Nouveau, not by Russia or the Baltic States. The construction of this bracelet is typical Polish.

 

I agree. This is quite recent, I have similar bought new. It's nice stuff.

 

Thanks Any for your as usual illuminated answers....Yup Poland was never Soviet, only a temporary state change.
One thing i wanted to ask also, i know Amber is resin and for that matter organic, the silver still needs to be washed properly as it is quite grimey, i know soap and other detergents can damage amber, wondering how i could go about cleaning the silver properly without affecting the amber.

 

A short and gentle wash won't do any damage.
Don't soak it, but wash it just as long as you would wash your hands. Make sure you dry it thoroughly, using a soft towel. If there is any gunk left in the crevices, gently prise it out with a wooden toothpick or cocktail stick.
Then use a silver polishing cloth on the silver. People here often advise a sunshine cloth.

 

This is far from my area of expertise, other than that I used to take in interest in a type of jewellery that was sometimes made in the USSR. Since you did not originally say, & I did not know that

I assumed there was something about the piece that led to this assertion:

 

All good Bronwen, neither is it mine, the assertion from what i was pretty certain that the piece was made between the early 50's and the late 80's ( the time when Poland was under communist rules).

 

I am still learning about things, so got a question. Would this amber be "egg yolk amber" or is that something totally different?

 

I only just saw your question, Jaime.
It looks like butterscotch amber in the photos, egg yolk amber is more yellow.

 

lovely. seen shops in Danzig full of them.

 

Hey Fid, Danzig is not Deutsch ......Gdansk.

 

reminds me of Dana, the duchess of the whole of Poland and South Chicago that thought Pilsudski was a democrat.