Message #44477

[Joey Silver / Si Zhouyi 義周司]

Dear George,

    What is the source of your statement re.drilling and bottles being 18th C.?
I would have thought the 18th C. bottles have an internal surface of the base that is totally polished smooth. The sloppiness inherent in a bottle where you can see the indentations from drilling the base, I would ascribe to late 19th C. and 20th C. bottles, rather than 18th C.
Best,
Joey

George,

Congratulations on your new acquisitions !

I wish could actually keep them..  Something interesting I learned about the process used during the 18th century to create the base of the bottle.  They would use core type drill at both ends and once in the center. Then grind out the remaining moving laterally across the base..  Interestingly, it can actually help to date this to being 18th, and we can see a slight dip where the core drill was used..