Plumbata
Well-Known Member
That is one of the coolest things I have seen on this forum in a long time! Thanks a lot for sharing that with us! I wouldn't be surprised if there are a few more bottles hidden in there, probably beneath the 3 roughly parallel bottles which are more or less exposed that were probably at the top of the device they used to shape it. If it feels particularly light, then that would be even more solid evidence than my conjecture. I've never seen anything like that, and would honestly keep it together if I had it, though if you tastefully and carefully exposed the visible bottles in a uniform manner (like the way fossil dealers prepare their items) then it would look quite a bit better and might allow you to reveal any embossing, which would significantly increase the known value of the block. It well may be a chunk of chinking, but if the cabin had uniform brick-sized and shaped gaps then someone REALLY sucked at building it!
That's a real mystery, but personally, I would bet that it was made after a brick and mortar building project was completed and they had extra mortar left over that the thrifty builder didn't want to waste by dumping somewhere. "Might as well make an extra brick or two that could possibly be used in the future" they probably thought, but considering its placement within an empty space, they probably thought better of it ultimately.
That's the kind of thing people might find in a million years (if our descendants even make it that long) when excavating ancient sites for fossilized bottles! [] Anyway, I'm impressed. That piece totally rocks!
edit: As far as value is concerned, you could probably get around 5 bucks each for the unembossed pontiled bottles, perhaps 10 of you found the right buyer with too much cash to burn, but the item as a whole could probably get ya 50-100 assuming the right people saw it. If there are embossed bottles in there, you would get their value plus the novelty value of such a unique item. I am not the best in terms of estimating value, but no one else has done so at this point so its a start, at least.
That's a real mystery, but personally, I would bet that it was made after a brick and mortar building project was completed and they had extra mortar left over that the thrifty builder didn't want to waste by dumping somewhere. "Might as well make an extra brick or two that could possibly be used in the future" they probably thought, but considering its placement within an empty space, they probably thought better of it ultimately.
That's the kind of thing people might find in a million years (if our descendants even make it that long) when excavating ancient sites for fossilized bottles! [] Anyway, I'm impressed. That piece totally rocks!
edit: As far as value is concerned, you could probably get around 5 bucks each for the unembossed pontiled bottles, perhaps 10 of you found the right buyer with too much cash to burn, but the item as a whole could probably get ya 50-100 assuming the right people saw it. If there are embossed bottles in there, you would get their value plus the novelty value of such a unique item. I am not the best in terms of estimating value, but no one else has done so at this point so its a start, at least.