708 - Fischland-Schmuck Ribnitz, amber bracelet of 835 silver with fish links, Baltic jewellery

Fischland-Schmuck Ribnitz, amber bracelet of 835 silver with fish links, Baltic jewellery 835 silver and amber. Amber bracelet by Fischland-Schmuck, Ribnitz, the clasp link with fineness mark “835” and maker's mark in the form of a fish; link bracelet of five larger, domed ambers in bezel settings, alternating with five pierced intermediate links, each of three stylised fish above curved wires; hook clasp with safety chain. Good condition. L. 19.5 cm. Fischland-Schmuck was designed by the Ribnitz goldsmith Walter Kramer after he had taken over his parents' business in 1932: he combined maritime forms in silver such as fish, waves and nets with amber from the Baltic, and his designs quickly found favour; in 1947 the business employed around 80 people. Kramer was forced out of Ribnitz and built up a new company in Travemünde, while from 1948 a state-owned enterprise in Ribnitz continued to make the Fischland pieces, which for legal reasons were later sold under the name Ostseeschmuck. The stylised fish, as it appears here as maker's mark, has been the company emblem of VEB Ostsee-Schmuck Ribnitz-Damgarten since 1958. Ribnitz-Damgarten lies at the gateway to the Fischland-Darß-Zingst peninsula and calls itself the amber town: amber working has a long tradition there, and since 1975 the German Amber Museum, housed in the monastery since 1987, has presented the natural and cultural history of Baltic amber. Amber, the fossil resin of Tertiary pine forests, is washed ashore along the entire Baltic coast, most abundantly one to two days after the autumn storms and in the cold winter months, when amber floats almost at the surface of the cold sea; “der Bernstein kommt” (the amber is coming), the amber hunters then say.