Topic: Antique Perfume bottle (I think)..but how old and from where ?

[ian the sculptor]

I assume this tiny handmade bottle is for perfume. But has anyone any thoughts on age and where it was made? It measures just over 3.5 inches long.
Thanks
Ian

[bat20]

Interesting piece !not something I’ve come across before,has the glass got bubbles and bits in it ?

[flying free]

I'm being cautious because I really don't know, but the design, pincering etc on the bottle and the glass make me think it's quite an old piece and possibly designed for holding drops of religious water or something like that on shrine visits or something.

m

[Anne]

I wonder if it's for smelling salts rather than perfume?  It looks like it should have had a top to keep the salts in, perhaps like this one... https://www.antique-gown.com/en/showcases-objects/smelling-salts-bottle,-silver,-ca-1820-1830.html

[ian the sculptor]

No bubbles that I can see and it was difficult to tell if the black specks are in the glass or inside the bottle, so I gave it a wash and they were mainly specks of dust. There does appear to be very minuscule bits when looked at with an eye glass, but not noticeable otherwise.
Those are both interesting suggestions.  No sign of it having a top as such, Anne, so I imagine a cork stopper, but that could have had a decorative metal finial. If it were for religious water then a simple cork could have been sealed with wax, but certainly no signs of any fitting on the outside of the neck that would have come from a metal top as in Anne's example.
Ian

[chopin-liszt]

Along similar lines, was it not the case a very    long time ago, that when the rich were out and about, they held scented posies and nosegays to help disguise the stench of sewage and other people in the streets? Would this be a vessel for such a perfume?
Small enough for the hand, and discrete. Small enough to bury in with some flowers which did not have enough scent on their own?

[cagney]

  Smelling bottles, scent bottles, or pungents  as they were sometimes termed very popular in the 18th and 19th centuries. They seem to cover all the the decorating techniques and types of glass. Generally a bottle such as yours would be dated late 18th or early 19th century and most likely English.

[ian the sculptor]

Searching the net after the previous suggestions, the closest I’ve found is this one. It’s slightly larger at 4.8 inches tall. Described as a “C16th Facon de Venise glass bottle with applied Rigaree” Glass in the “fashion of Venice” but made in other European countries was popular.
2 photos of the same bottle it seems.
Ian

Mod: Copyright images removed. See them at https://www.barnebys.co.uk/auctions/lot/16th-c-facon-de-venise-glass-bottle-w-applied-rigaree-Oym3Nhldxp

[flying free]

That's what I had in mind exactly.  And probably exactly that bottle.  However having searched the collections and read up in my books, all the bottles seem to be squarer and larger than your little bottle. 
But it does remind me of those.  They seemed to have a little lid of wax with a string around the neck.

If they aren't your photographs the mod will need to remove them from the board though due to copyright 

Anyway, it's a very interesting piece.  A lovely find.

m

[chopin-liszt]

Then while those images are still here, I have looked carefully at the rigaree - it is much crisper, neater and tidier on the square bottle than it is on Ian's, I'm afraid.
Very similar items, but I would doubt the same manufacturer or even age.