Topic: Dog decanter id please ID = Aalborgs Glasvaerk

[WhatHo!]

Hi Guys, I'm pretty sure this is Scandinavian and I have been trying to do a bit of research on it. I thought Holmegaard when I first saw it but it seems there are others who made them. Names so far are Holmegaard, Aaborgs Glasverk and Faglavksglas, they may be others and I cant seem to get a match.
Mine is 9" long, noticeable features are long ears (compared to others I have seen), tucked under legs, the tails is hollow so liquid can flow into it from the body and the rigeree on the side goes from back to front. The handle is finished with no finesse, just pushed down with no thought of crimping it or making it fancy in any way. Another interesting feature is that it hasn't got a 'button' on the front that is often seen (this is actually where the pontil rod snapped off and then ground flat) it has a snapped unfinished pontil. I think the glass has a slight darkish tone to it, not crystal clear.
Any help most appreciated, TIA Wolfie

[Ivo]

"Fyldehund" decanter, Aalborgs Glasvaerk, 1885.
Ears hanging, dog sitting down, nose shaped for cork. Length 23,5 cm.
Identical one in the Aalborg historiske museum.

[WhatHo!]

Awesome Ivo, much appreciated

[Pinkspoons]

Not to step on anyone's toes, but...

I've had a few of these over the years and whilst Aalborg did make this type of bottle, they weren't the only ones. The problem with trying to definitively identify these is that this exact model was made across pretty much the whole of Scandinavia at some point in the last century or two.

Plus there are - or were in the last decade - a small handful of small glassworks in Denmark reproducing them in an antique style (greyed glass, errant bubbles, slightly squiffy proportions). And because they were more novelty than functional even the older examples often turn up in near-pristine condition.

So they're not an easy one to pin down. But they do tend to pop up in Sweden more than Denmark (Aalborg was relatively short-lived, and Holmegaard fyldehund from the same period, and later, had a quite different form).

[Ivo]

I trust the "Dansk Glas" Book which has an identical fyldehund.

[Pinkspoons]

The point wasn't so much that the Dansk Glas book is wrong (I've owned a copy for a good few years, and it is impeccably researched), but rather that there will be, somewhere, a book on Swedish glass with an identical fyldehund, a book on Norwegian glass with an identical fyldehund, and a glassworks catalogue from ten years ago with an identical fyldehund.

[WhatHo!]

The problem with trying to definitively identify these is that this exact model was made across pretty much the whole of Scandinavia at some point in the last century or two.

Hi Pinkspoons, thanks for your comments, I was already aware that there was different types.
I do not know very much about these but I do know a fair bit about blown glass. A google image search reveals many and at a quick glance they look similar but actually they are not same model at all. As with IDing any handmade glassware the attention is in the detail, I could soon see that there were difference in legs, ears, body shape, pontil mark, colour etc. Although they are all dog decanters the different makers have different techniques and styles, this is plain to see.
If mine matches a credited example from an excellent source then IMHO don't see an improvement in the identification occurring?
Who do you think made it?
thanks again for your help guys, cheers Wolfie

[Pinkspoons]

I pulled out my copy of Dansk Glas, and also Glashaandvaerk i Danmark (by the same author, a decade later), and both refer to them as 'Swedish type' decanters.

Kastrup & Holmegaard's Glassworks 1825-71 (again, same author) mentions that the North Jutland glassworks, of which Aalborg was one, often shared many of the same workers, managers and designs - so even within Denmark itself, whilst the decanter might have been well-recorded at Aalborg, it doesn't mean it couldn't have been produced by local glassworks of which little is now known.

It's also mentioned across the different books that many Aalborg glassworkers hailed from Sweden and Germany.

The extent to which quite small differences in form can be used to determine origin when it comes to notoriously wonky pre-war Scandinavian glass is probably up for strong debate - for example, there exists a Holmegaard fyldehund in the factory's own collection that is dramatically different to a Holmegaard fyldehund in the Peter F. Heering collection, illustrated in Danish Glass 1814-1914, on which the eyes, nose and ears do not match at all!

And, of small differences, I would say that yours is not a *perfect* match for the one in the Aalborg collection - the head/body size ratio is a little different, the flattened rim on the nose appears much thicker on yours, and the point of contact between the tail and the back is a lot less refined on yours (the Aalborg one is neater, rounded, and turned up with a small crimp).

But if you want it to be Aalborg, let it be Aalborg - it's really as good a punt as any. Without any provenance, and after a decade of collecting/buying/selling Danish glass, I'd personally just be more cautious/loose in my attribution.

[WhatHo!]

I do not want to be Aalborg any more than any other company, I am just trying to find out who made it. You clearly have some good knowledge on the subject so in your opinion who did make it?

[Pinkspoons]

If it's older, and all other things being equal,  the weight of probability lies with one of a number of glassworks in Sweden - Aalborg stopped its white glass production in 1910, giving it a maximum 25 year window to produce them all.

And there are quite a few in this same style. Especially in Sweden, in my experience.

If it's newer, then I know a large quantity of them were made by Glasmageriet in Mygdal, Denmark, some short years back.

In short: I dunno. But neither does anyone else with any precision.