APOTHECARY POISON TWO BOTTLES

[woody]

Does the top of the crown top unscrew?

 

[Harry Pristis]

I don't think the mouth is too large, Woody. The bottle without the stopper is only 1.75" tall -- these are very small, like "travelling" inks.

I see now that bearfan has stated the mouth opening is .75". No problem. I have two cobalt "square inkwells" with mouth-openings of .75" and .875". The mouths of Carter's 1897 cone inks in a recent thread are .75" wide.

These latest pix do indicate that these are hand-finished bottles, the green one almost certainly. As travelling inkwells, I think the owner is not gonna' be economically devastated by the investment he made.

Still, there are those nagging labels. Did the Russians re-cycle these little bottles to hold samples of enriched uranium? Do your hands glow in the dark, bearfan? []

----------Harry Pristis

 

[bearfan]

The top to the crowns do unscrew. They do not however come off---the get to a certain poit and then stop. If you want any more pictures please let me know. This is a bit of fun just trying to figure it out, that may be worth the invesment alone[] except if somone came along and said it was a recycled avon bottle!!! []

 

[woody]

What does the bottom of the cork look like?
Is it hollow?
I'm thinking that those type of crown tops I've seen on Holy water bottles that the tops unscrew to sprinkle the water.

 

[woody]

If it was an ink bottle, Harry, I believe the cork would be stained with the color of the ink, which it doesn't appear to be.
The label and top may not be from the bottle, though.
Of course this could be something that someone fabricated to pique someones curiosity.

 

[bearfan]

Woody, the corks are hollow with the metal from the crown coming to the very bottom of the cork. Hmmmm from inkwells to holly water.....all that from what I thought was or still may be a poison bottle. I am not an expert---I just thought that they were neat looking. I like the crowns and I thought the labels were interesting. I am looking all over the web following your suggestions to hopefully find out some more information.

 

[bearfan]

if nothing else, these will be very well photographed bottles I have![]

 

[Harry Pristis]

Yes, Woody, the stoppers are suspect, as are the labels. That has been my direction from the start.

The bottles themselves, however, seem to be perfectly good, hand-finished, inkiforms (new term). They are good matches, but smaller, to "square inkwells" illustrated in Covill's book. The green is a very desirable color.

There's no telling what these bottles were used for secondarily, though we can say that they are not known poison bottles nor are they known cosmetics bottles.

Without the stoppers and bogus(?) labels, I think ink collectors would snap these up. One way to check is to take them to a bottle show and show them to a few serious ink and poison collectors. I might leave the stoppers in my pocket initially.

Let us know what you find out, bearfan.

------------Harry Pristis

 

[Maine Digger]

Bearfan, something you said earlier caught my attention, you said the metal on the stoppers was very 'soft'. Is there any chance that metal is stearling silver? I've come across old silver in some of my digs on various objects, so i was just wondering. Harry is right though, those are a lot better looking without the stoppers. You might want to think about whether those labels should stay put or not. That's was interesting about this hobby, quite often something comes along that really makes you work at identification, and the payoff is always there, rare or common, real or fake, you always walk away having learned something.

 

[bearfan]

hhmmm, I have bought many things in the past, and never have I had to take something away from an item to make it more interesting. Here is a thought, and mind you this may be very naive thinking here. The stoppers fit the bottle perfectly. The corks stop where they should, and the rim of the metal matches up with the rim of each bottle perfectly. What are the chances in the wild that a bottle is found, and then a cork that fits it perfectly is also found. Now double that equation. It just seems odd the stoppers fit so perfectly, but are not original to the bottle. Say the stoppers were fabricated for the bottle, why would someone go through so much trouble to do this??? I would be afraid to take them apart only to find that I actually had a real unique item and destroyed it. I am going to try and contact the dealer through the shop to see if I can find out where he may have gotten them. I will let you all know what I find out. This has been a learning experience for me. I now know for sure that I got my moneys worth in knowledge, even if the bottles only turn out to be worth a couple bucks. Thank You all for your help. []
John