Thread: Unknown stone. ID please.

Don't make the mistake that Llyn Melynllyn (Welsh for Yellow Lake) is a particular variety of hone slate. In early years it may well be that just the honing slates in the immediate vicinity of Llyn Melynllyn were quarried, but 'Yellow Lake' soon acquired brand name status and encompassed a number of slates all from different quarries all sold under the Yellow Lake trademark with no distinction as to origin or performance. That means you cannot even standardise within the confines of a single brand (rather than 'type') of hone. A friend reckons that the stones could have been quarried at four different sites. Early stones seem to have been packed in a box provided by A B Salmen, a london company started in 1850 by Samuel Salmen of Mile End for his son Albert Berl Salmen that provided all sorts of english, welsh and german hones as well as coticules and the like - they were active in the late 1800s at Houndsditch, London, then at Aldgate (executors). A listing of mines from 1908 shows the Llyn Melynllyn owned by the executors of A B Salmen, Mr Salmen having died, evidently. In 1926 we find that the firm has changed name again. It was A B Salmen Ltd, but a resolution was passed in September 1926 to voluntary wind-up the company and appoint Mr E G Bygrave chartered accountant of Wardour Street, London, as the liquidator. The firm was sold to A. Bernstein. A little later the firm emerges in a new guise - The Successors of A B Salmen Ltd - having been bought by Mr R. Waxman and they were active until the late 1980s, running the business from Highgate Hill in London.

The earlier (1890s) advertisements show that A B Salmen's themselves were the successors to S. Samuel. The earlier firm also seems to have been a stone quarrier and importer and furnisher of carpenters bags, etc. On the reverse of an 1890 advert it says "Importer & quarrier. Hones, oilstones, grindstones, scythestones &c, carpenters tool & hand basket importer. Office 1 Castle St. Houndsditch. E.C. Steam works, Salmen St. South Grove, Mile End, London. E. ... [On the reverse] Turkey oilstones, Arkansa ... Water of Ayr stone, Ragstones, Scythe stones, Devon batts, Indian pond stones. Yellow Lake hones, German ... Blue & grey stone slips, Gold testing stones, Clearing stones and curriers' blocks, Turkey, Arkansa & Putty powder, Holy stones, Circular stones, all kinds. Bilston, Blue grit, Newcastle, Yorkshire and other grindstones, also mounted in Iron and Wooden troughs. Importers of tool and painters' baskets".

A B Salmen was well respected among the jewish community of Hackney. Not only was a street named after him, but in 1884 he was elected Warden of Hackney Synagogue and held the post without interruption for 22 years. He died in October 1907, hence the use of 'Exors' (meaning executors) preceeding the company name in 1908. The 1891 Census shows him as being aged 37 and his profession as 'oil stone merchant'.

Albert Berl Salmen's father, Samuel Salomen (changed to Salmen) was born in Prussia in 1818 and the UK 1871 Census shows his occupation as 'stone merchant'.

The boxes underwent a number of changes. Some say that the hones are Genuine Yellow Lake Oilstones, registered & Supplied Direct by the Quarrier. These - the yellow coloured packets anyway - have no mention of A B Salmen on them. However, Salmen's were noted for supplying all sorts of scythe stones, hone stones and masons/carpenters toolbags, and a picture of these things appears on the label just as they do in some of Salmen's other advertising material. Other packets have Salmens name on them, and there are red, yellow and blue varieties and perhaps one other, but I forget....

Most of the hones appear greyish in colour, the actual purple ones being in the minority, and the grit equivalent of these varies between 6k and somewhere below 10k for the most part. However there is one other type that differs in colour and composition - it is almost black (or a very, very dark grey) and instead of being a siliceous slate it is a calcareous siltstone and gives results much like a Silkstone, superior to the rest of the Yellow Lake family of honing slates. The grit equivalent of one of these would be in the region of 11k or so.

The Silkstone is a mystery in itself. It comes in a buff coloured wrapper mostly, although smaller sizes were issued in tins and some were even distributed to the armed forces. The card sleeve has "Silkstone, Razor Hone and Whetting Stone, to be used with oil or water" on it and along another side it has "A Cambrock Product" which implies that 'Cambrock' is a company name, but UK Companies House has no record of it ever having been registered. That makes me think it is a combination of two words - 'cambrian' and 'rock', cambrian directing us back to Wales as a source for the Quarry.

Regards,
Neil

doorsch
You can't tell from my pics but the stone has small black specks and a hard to see pattern similar to your pics.
I wish I had a better camera and the sill to use it.

Lexx - are the black specks well defined as in this pic of a Water of Ayr-



There is sometimes a very thin line connecting the spots, sometimes not. They tend to be larger than 'specks' however.

Regards,
Neil

On average they are about 1mm in size and the largest I can see is 2mm. What make it harder to see is the fact that the stone sucks the oils from your skin and leaves a dark finger print.

Originally Posted by lexx

On average they are about 1mm in size and the largest I can see is 2mm. What make it harder to see is the fact that the stone sucks the oils from your skin and leaves a dark finger print.

That the fingerprints are visible ist mostly common....but for shure a Water of Ayr could also be in discussion....
so better pics would be great...

The only pic of the specks I could get.


Sorry I can't get better but it dose look more like your pics doorsch more then Neil.

Yeah, those specks aren't much like WoA spots.

It is hard to see from the photo (the stone is on a thin dark thing with water running over the hone and spilling down the sides, right? Ignoring the artefacts (run lines) introduced by the water, there does seem to be a slight banding of lighter and darker greys, so perhaps it is a thuringian, which is another type of honing slate which often exhibits some layering effects. It would be soft like slate, but the slurry would be easy to raise and of a creamy consistency with very little work involved. Some even auto-slurry, giving rise to a thin 'slime' while honing.

The pics give a contrary view of the stone - the first one looks like it has a purple element to it, even the slurry on the green cutting mat looks pinkish, whilst others make it look like a plain grey slate. The small spots are reminiscent of silkstones and some thuringians, but they are present in many other hones, too, so not a reliable indicator.

Really impossible to say what it is without sg measurements and actually using/feeling/experiencing it first hand, so everything here is just conjecture anyway, as noted in the UK forum.

Adrspach is in the UK and has a great knowledge and hands-on experience of most british hone stones, odds are that he would know what it was if he ever got to use it.

Regards,
Neil

Originally Posted by lexx

I'm from the uk so I think this stone might be too. I think its a natural stone. Its a soft stone thats dark gray almost black. I've lapped it to 600 on wet and dry paper.



The bottom.


I was told to post here by UKRob on another forum.

From the first look there is quite a good chance that this is a thuringian. The overall appearances fits, the breakouts are very typical and the form and depth of the scratches is typical - at least for a slate hone. From the color i tis hard to say, better take pictures on a black background. But I got quite a lot of thuringian that would look exactly the same being photographed on this surface. Some pics of the hone sides could help!

If that was up to me there would be two options:
1. unknown UK slate cut to size for specific purpose.
2. for me more probable would be Thuri type hone due to coloring, softness, slurry and size.

As with mentioning genuine LM and DT - not fakes often sold on bay. They are different hones even though they are not from one quarry and also so far LMs have quite specific sizes.

I got a fellin I know what it is Lexx,,,wanna know,,,