An insignia, attached to the outside of a house that represented the insurer of the house. There were used commonly in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to indicate which properties were insured. Property owners would pay fire fighting companies in advance and in return receive a fire mark in order to identify the property as having purchased coverage.
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An insignia, generally metal, once placed on buildings insured by the insurer represented by the mark. Since the insurers had their own fire brigades, they had to check the mark on a burning building to determine whether or not they should extinguish the fire.
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UK: Plaques or medallions fixed on walls as a means of identifying the insurer of that property. The early fire insurers owned their own fire brigades and could be called to their own’ fires. See FIRE PLATE.
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Term used to describe the successors to the fire mark in the later 19th and earlier 20th century. They are mostly of copper or tin and do not bear a policy number.
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UK: The successor to the fire mark used in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.