Silver plated copper

Older tableware and cutlery are made from a copper/nickel/zinc alloy, commonly called German silver or nickel silver (among other names) (I am discounting stainless cutlery here)

The nickel in the alloy makes it a hard alloy that allows a durable cutting edge on knives, stops it bending the fork legs, and also aids in the electroplating of a thin layer of silver over the top.
It is an almost "white" copper alloy and any scratches to the silver plating can be almost invisible because the base metal is so similar to the plating layer.



There is no silver in the alloy, just a layer of silver as the plating. Pure silver is just too soft to use for knives and forks.
Likewise would be the use of pure copper for tableware, its just to soft to maintain its shape or cutting edge, and would become useless very soon.

I havent yet seen a yard that has a separate category for this alloy, and here in NZ, yards tends to just class it as brass (my yard classes it as stainless and it goes in their staino bins)
I just store it up now for use in the foundry later, its a great "white" copper alloy to have.