Excellent Dad, that is what I call waterproof evidence. What do we know now?
Lea claims the following:
Lea wrote:The name of the metal is melchior, an alloy of copper, nickel, and zinc.
No, that is not the case. Melchior (Мельхиор) is an alloy of copper, nickel and
IRON or copper and nickel
but no zink. clearly proved by Dad's document.
We also know that the mark
МНЦ is copper, nickel and zinc. i.e. German silver/alpaca Also proved by Dad's document. Lea's statement above is a good example of how people tend to believe things to be, but they aren't!
Lea wrote:Your statement shows exactly where the problem lies: 'I-OMMET' is not an 'alloy/metal': there is not more 'content' to it than any other maker's name/stamp. It simply means that it was made by the Mstera Jewellers factory. The closest it comes to declaring anything about content is the MET part, which was a commonly used designation for non-precious metal. It doesn't even say what sort of base metal was used. Just think of I-OMMET as a name, nothing more, nothing to do with content.
OK, so be it but what is the alloy objects are made of and marked with the mark "ЮММЕТ"? That we do not know ....yet!
Here is another problem to solve. Many filigree objects are marked
ЮММЕТ. If the alloy would be German silver as claimed, I'd like to know is it possible to produce so thin wires of German silver that such objects can be manufactured in filigree? I have understood that German silver (МНЦ) is a rather stiff and and fragile material (I could be wrong. In that case kindly correct me).
In addition, it has also been claimed but not proved that the alloy behind the mark "
ЮММЕТ" would be Ag and Ni. That would change the situation. Meanwhile, waiting for Lea's promised pictures of the boxes, show me that I'm wrong....I might be, but...?