Need help with Silver Serving Spoon, please ~ 96 mark

Hello All ~ Been a While! Hope this finds everyone well...and staying out of trouble.

Can anyone help with this spoon? Where, Who, When...the usual. The only mark I can see clearly, is the 96. If I knew something about 96 mark, the others might make some sense...but I'm not familiar!

A question on monograms ~ I should know this by my age, but......
My picture showing the monogram might be upside down because I've never known what's correct!! I always thought it made sense that you should be able to read the mono when table was set, but then I think I read they are not done that way. I usually Google stuff like this...just haven't gotten around to this one yet.

Thanks for helping.

 

I am wondering if this is Russian??? Have you tried to do a pencil rubbing to pull up the marks better?

 

I think Laura could be right. 96 Zolotniki was a Russian fineness, it equals 1000, so pure silver.
The kokoshnik mark was introduced 1896-99, so if it is Russian it dates from before that. It certainly looks older.

The others will be around later to tell you more.

 

Russian seems very unlikely, no proper marks, and wouldn't be made of 96 zolotnik silver anyway - would be helpful to see clear pics of marks, but believe silverplate more likely, seem to recall '96' on some German electroplate, but other countries are possible too...

~Cheryl

 

Hi Libby! Good to see you back!

Any way you could do a rubbing of the rectangular mark? Even part of it may help figure out the name.

 

Thanks to everyone! Hi Bakers

Laura ~ Any Jewelry...
I too, thought Russian at first...but the marks just didn't seem to work the more I read. I did get super excited initially though, when I read that 96 is pure silver! But Cheryl has now burst that bubble and confirmed it's not Russian (I do hope you're wrong about the silverplate, Cheryl!) I didn't think of this before, but I wonder how durable/strong a spoon would be in pure silver?

I tried the pencil rubbing ~ with no success. The marks are so worn. I tried for better pics, too. Not sure these are better but I think it's the best possible. Maybe someone will be able to piece together the mark by taking bits and pieces from these...thank you again for helping with this.

 

Oops, sorry about that. Not Russian, so....

 

Sorry, I've been really busy/tired, and still am, and not able to make out your marks, but just don't know of any country that uses a '96' mark for solid silver, and though believe I've seen it, it is uncommon as a plating number too. This spoon, if Russian silver, would be unlikely to even be any higher than 84 zolotnik, and you might find a fine silver spoon in some sort of fancy presentation piece, but I'd think that fairly unlikely, or perhaps in a small light-use item, though fine silver isn't particularly uncommon for Asian spoons, as well as other items.

Here is a German silverplate spoon bearing a '96', and I keep thinking I've seen it on electroplate from somewhere else too, but not finding any in quick searches: https://www.925-1000.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28894 , but in this case, rather than the '96' being an indicator of the plating quality, it's actually Bohrmann's year of production, putting an alternate meaning of the '96' on your piece in question as well: http://www.ascasonline.org/ARTICOLOMARZ239.html

~Cheryl

 

So Sorry, Cheryl! I missed this reply until now. Thanks for taking the time to research and write. Much appreciated!!