Featured Dutch Silver Matchbox Stand

I would not normally add something like this to my collection, but it was too cute for me not to share...



I find it curious that there's only one hallmark on it - the Dutch mark for 833 silver.

 

It is part of a smoker's set, which also had a cedar lined cigarette box and an ashtray. Some had a cigar cutter and cigar box as well.

That is the proper hallmark and the only one that is mandatory.
A maker's mark doesn't make any difference to the value in this case. These silver Old Dutch Master's painting scenes were manufactured in great numbers between ca 1900-1940s.
Your scenes could be from paintings by Jan Steen.

 

Aka drunks at a bar. If I ever find something like this, it's plated. Congrats on scoring a real one.

 

Thanks for that. I knew if anybody knew, it'd be you

When I won it (along with some other silver) I was seriously questioning if it was real or not. It was part of a bunch of other silverware I bought (eight pieces in a lot) and so far, only three of them were silver, and three were silver plate, and I was thinking that this would also be plate.

I scanned the entire piece, and yes, I was very surprised when I saw the mark confirming silver.

I keep it on my desk, now. The matches will be handy when I melt sealing wax.

 

I still have a cigarette box in the same style. It was a present to my parents for their engagement in 1946, just after WWII.
In those days it was still difficult to find nice gifts of value, so much silver and gold had been stolen by the Nazis, and rebuilding the country took priority over mundane things like silver boxes.
But my parent's box had been hidden during the war along with more jeweller's stock, and inscribed with the date of the engagement in 1946.
It also has a Jan Steen scene, btw.