Hi Mark,
I think you're right, insofar as two metals make it more complicated. I'm still skeptical about the age of the piece.
So far as the mother-of-pearl goes, I was trying to avoid that. So far as I know, the shell decoration in the PNW was abalone, while mother-of-pearl technically comes from the pearl oyster. Yes, we're talking about something that occurs in more than these two molluscs, but the basic point is that abalone tends to be a bit bluer than mother-of-pearl, I think. As to whether those eyes are MOP or abalone, I haven't a good guess.
F
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