paktong

Anglicisation of Cantonese 白銅／白铜 (baak6 tung4, “white copper”).

• Rhymes: -ɒŋ

paktong (countable and uncountable, plural paktongs)

1. An alloy of zinc, copper and nickel, closely resembling silver, of Chinese origin; any of a number of similar alloys developed in imitation of the Chinese product.
   • 1980, James Thomas Herbert Baily, The Connoisseur: an Illustrated Magazine for Collectors, Volume 205, page 108,

     Chinese export metalwork consists almost entirely of three categories: silverware; pewterware; and paktong, an alloy of zinc, copper and nickel, closely resembling silver, which the Chinese also described as tutenague, and which was probably worked by white metalsmiths also making pewter.

   • 1928, The Metal industry, Volume 31, page 227,

     Many German-silver paktongs were soon flourishing under a variety of trade names, […]

   • 1995, Duncan R. Hook, David R. M. Gaimster, British Museum. Dept. of Scientific Research, Trade and Discovery: The Scientific Study of Artefacts from Post-Medieval Europe and Beyond, page 265,

     From the surviving descriptions it seems likely that during the later eighteenth century most paktong items were sold (in England at least) misleadingly under the name tutenag.