Thank you all for your comments. I apologize for failing to include a full length image of the blade and correct that now.
For many years I never polished the silver mountings, but at one point I gave in to my late mother's desire to see the silver shine. As I recall, before that there was little blackening in the base of the stamped letters of the 'Napoleon III' inscription. I personally believe that the inscription is entirely spurious and added later and represents one person's somewhat indelible comment of who the picture represents. The difference of technique, the precision of the inscription, its greater sharpness and how it is forced into an existing space all signal to me that it has nothing to do with the platero who mounted this knife. Personally, I believe that these are 'folk art' representations of military leaders in Argentinean conflicts of the early and mid nineteenth century.
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