Topic: Mdina with a mystery stopper & mark

[billben]

Hi All
Im afraid I havent been here in a while due to personal commitments but hopefully things will be back to normal in a week or so.

My knowledge about Mdina is pretty limited but I recently aquired this large decanter & stopper and after 2 hours or trolling the internet to find a similar one I gave up. All the examples i found have ball stoppers, not the spiked stopper like this one and I wondered if anyone could throw any light on it.

In addition I was a little baffeld by the signature marks on the base. Signed 'Mdina' with I assume the date of 1990 and a model number,  in addition it is marked 'eu' (lower case) does this refer to 'european union' or is it a makers mark.

I should add that the mdina sticker is a plastic one which if I am right fits in with the 1990 date.

Many thanks in anticipation

Hopefully the pics will be of good enough quality ... the decanter stands 10" tall to the tip of the stopper

[chopin-liszt]

The colourway you have there is Marble, and as the stopper matches, it's right.
The ball stoppers were made earlier, a spikey one must be a bit newer. This is a colourway that has been in production for a very long time.
It looks to be dated '04. We don't know what any numbering system means.

[billben]

Many thanks for your reply.  I can see it isnt very clear on the photo but what you assume is 04 is actually 'eu' in lower case. I had wondered if this was for European Union or some makers mark.

I assumed the 90 related to the date there is then a space and 116 which i assumed was a model number.

Thanks for confirming what I thought that it was the Marble colourway

 

[chopin-liszt]

If they are putting "EU" on things that would be new, although recently it was a Maltese chap who was president of the EU. But if that were the case, it I would think it would be the proper upper case EU.
It's in the position you'd normally find the date. It's the other numbers that we don't know meanings of.

[billben]

LOL  I always manage to find things that ad to the confusion ... on closer inspection and under a glass, and doing my best to agree with your suggestion I could with a bit of a squint, believe it was an 0 with a tiny tail and a rounded 4 as opposed to a lower case e (but other dates i have seen are in full so would it not have been 2004 ?)  That said its still a wonderful piece of Mdina which speaks for itself, wether its 1990 or 2004 I am still surprised i have been unable to see other examples on the net of this spiked stopper.... oh my goodnes it must be rare LOL !!!

Thanks again

[chopin-liszt]

 
At least we both agree that what matters most is that you really like it.
We're only debating about 14 years, which isn't really much. It's got the plastic label which puts it into the '90s.
I'm never worried about what's scratched on the bottom of a bit of glass I love.
I just enjoy the glass. 

However, more information can add to the interest.

[billben]

I couldnt agree more that its the piece of glass itself that really matters, I do however have an annoying habit of loving research on any subject and do sometimes spend far more times researching an item than it warrants but I do find that during my research I usually discover something I didnt know ... even if its got nothing to do with what Im researching LOL !
Thanks again for your input.

[chopin-liszt]

I'm sticking with my opinion that your mark is '04, not eu, but you can stick with your opinion that it is, if you're happier with that.  It's your decanter.
I'm not going to fall out with you over anything as minor as this!
I am thinking though, that your pointy stopper might be closer to '04 than to '90, because of the lack of them around?

I just think it unlikely to be eu (unless it was recent and to commemorate the presidency. But that was last year.) and the scratches on the bottom of Mdina can be read in lots of different ways. Tons of pieces are clearly marked "Molina".
Until you discover otherwise.
A lot of squinting and a bit of imagination is sometimes neccessary.

[billben]

I think Im coming round to your way of thinking, there is no logic to it being 'eu' even less so in lower case. I assume the marks are done with a vibro pen and having used one myself I know how they can wander off track..  accepting the 'e' is in fact an 'o' with a slight disfiguration due to the pen its then fullly acceptable that the lower case 'e' is in fact a rounded 4. Having written that I am now even more convinced you are right and its 04 ... the 90 119 being some sort of model number I imagine.  Still a little baffled as to why so few spiked decanters are shown on the net  but that doesnt in relate to our discussion about the marks.  Perhaps it wasnt a very popular item...perhaps we will never know.... for another 14 years ! 

[chopin-liszt]

It's a very popular colourway and has been in production since the mid-early '70s.
The spikey stopper is a newer variant of shape.
And I like it.