Royal Doulton Identifying Marks–Dating

Royal Doulton, like any other company has, over the course of its existence, changed its mark several times, although in many cases the changes were slight in nature and did not completely change the mark or style.

The Royal Doulton company began to use its mark in about 1879, and used that mark exclusively, save for speciality products for the span of years up to and including 1902, when it added the words, England, beneath the mark that it had been using.

The mark then used after 1902 was this one:

Most were such tiny changes as the addition of a crown, the inclusion of the words England, or some other thing that doesn’t change the overall scheme of things, however Royal Doulton has also done special marks, as do most companies, for special lines. One such example would be their Bunnykins line of products which are nursery ware, and don’t emulate the other products by using its mark.

The mark used on most Bunnykins products is this one:

Bunnykins Products markings

Every company of the size and quality of Doulton has its special range of products and most of these will have special marks, such as the range of products known as the GreenWood Tree range,  which will also offer a company logo letting you know that it comes from Royal Doulton as well. The GreenTree Range offers this mark,

Royal Doulton marks are distinct in that while they will not always give you the dating of the product, in some cases you can decipher the year that the product was made by doing some calculations.

From around 1879, til about 1902, the company used this backstamp, which was adapted from an earlier Lambeth mark, and uses four interlocking D’s, which was introduced somewhere around 1882. Post 1891, the Doulton Company added the word England below it and continued in that fashion til 1902, when  it was discontinued.

Beginning in 1913, a HN number was used on all products from Royal Doulton. This  number refers to
designer Harry Nixon of Royal Doulton. Harry Nixon was the artist in charge of painting.  A few of theother artists were John Sparkes, George Tinsworth, and Agnete Hoy. The HN numbers were chronological until 1940, and at this time blocks of numbers were assigned to the figurine modelers.
From 1928 to 1954, a small number was placed to the right of the crown on nearly every item that was manufactured. all That number when  added to the year 1927 will give the year of manufacture.
For example, in the figurine seen below, the encircled number (it will not be circled on the product, this was done to call your attention to it) bears the number ten.  1927 + 10 = 37. The figurine was by those calculations,produced in 1937.

 Please do take note however, that the cases of being able to identify the year of production are not always available.

 Dating of many items which were produced by Royal Doulton is not possible, as the factories at that point had no real system of marking things to offer us the year of production. It is possible to ROUGHLY calculate based on:

1902 and later —-"Royal Doulton"
1891 and later —- "England"
1930 and later (a few exceptions) — "Made in England"
The "HN" system of numbering figurines was created by
Harry Nixon and  for the most part, that system is still in use today.