Decoding the Stamps Inside a Diamond Hand Chain

<p>Turn the ring end of a hand chain over and you may find 585 struck into the band. That number is not a model code. It is the gold content, 58.5 percent pure, the metric way of saying 14 karat. Reading these marks is the fastest way to know what a hand chain, that bracelet-to-ring piece draped across the back of the hand, is really made of.</p><p>The karat family runs in a short set of numbers. 375 means 9k, uncommon in fine work. 585 is 14k, the everyday standard for a piece that flexes and takes friction. 750 is 18k, richer in color and softer. 999 is pure gold, too soft for a chain that gets pulled taut across a moving hand.</p><p>Letter marks sit next to the numbers and split the generations of a piece. An older hand chain might carry a worn maker's initial and little else. A newer one often adds a country hallmark and sometimes a metal-plus-number combo like AU585. Plating hides in the letters too. GP means gold plated, GF means gold filled, and either one next to a karat number is a contradiction worth questioning.</p><p>The traps cluster around the diamonds, not the gold. A stamp reading 1.00 CTTW covers total carat weight across every stone, so a chain scattered with tiny accents can hit a carat without a single sizable diamond. CTTW is not the same as one big stone, and sellers lean on the bigger number. The same trick shows up on hand chains priced by the gram, where a bright plating adds shine but almost no real weight.</p><p>Read it as a table. 585 plus a clean maker's mark plus a CTTW that matches the stones you can actually count. That combination is the hand chain worth chasing, because it means the metal, the mark, and the math all agree.</p>