white metal

1) Used of various alloys which owe their light grey colour to lead, tin or zinc.

It was made use of in the cutlery trade by buttonmakers in particular: in 1726 Stainforth Jennings, a Sheffield barber, had one Gro[ss] of White mettle buttons for sale.

places Sheffield
dates 1726

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Photo by Kreuzschnabel CC BY-SA 3.0