Of course, there are fakes everywhere. The worrying thing is that the legal system doesn't seem to care, those responsible only ever get prosecuted if the buyer takes them to court. It wasn't allways like this, when I started out in the 1970's there was a guy doing porridge for making fake equinoctial dials, ring dials, butterfields, etc, the guy was a great artisan and was only caught out because he got too greedy and the dials were turning up at Sotherbys and Christies too frequently. Suspicion was aroused and tests were done on the brass revealing it to be a modern alloy rolled brass and not eighteenth century founded brass. He only ended up in clink because he had to be made an example of for showing the big auction rooms up for what they are, lacking in expertees and greedier than he was! The annoying thing about ebay is that fakes are sold through it by the thousands on a weekly basis and very little is done about it. Fake peels are just the tip of the iceburg! Auctions disclaim responsibility and say we are only agents for the vendors but I think that if the law is followed to the letter they also have a responsibility and cases in the past have proved this to be the case. Still as someone else suggested, maybe one day the DVLA will go through the Peel register and there could be a few more folk sewing mail bags.
