Pewter Pewter Pewter () is a malleable metal alloy. It is traditionally composed of 85–99% tin, mixed with copper, antimony, bismuth, and sometimes silver or lead, although the use of lead is less common today. Copper and antimony act as hardeners while lead is more common in the lower grades of pewter, which have a bluish tint. Pewter has a low melting point, around , depending on the exact mixture of metals. The word "pewter" is probably a variation of the word "spelter", a term for zinc alloys (originally a colloquial name for zinc). Pewter was first used around the beginning
Native metal brass, bronze, pewter, German silver, osmiridium, electrum, white gold, and silver-mercury and gold-mercury amalgam. Only gold, silver, copper and the platinum metals occur in nature in large amounts. Over geological time scales, very few metals can resist natural weathering processes like oxidation, which is why generally only the less reactive metals such as gold and platinum are found as native metals. The others usually occur as isolated pockets where a natural chemical process reduces a common compound or ore of the metal, leaving the pure metal behind as small flakes or inclusions. Non-metallic elements occurring in the native state include