Glass Message Board
Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Topic started by: rose de verre on August 23, 2013, 03:41:20 PM
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Hi
Here is a tumbler, English or Irish [ most likely Irish ] which is cut with broad pillar flutes and has a high foot rim, very heavy indeed, I would guess it is 18thc, and with a lot of wear to the foot and with this strange mark which I have tried to picture - has anybody seen anything similar ? It looks like a bird on a nest of flames !!! Any suggestions welcome !
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Phoenix Glass Company Stourbridge area ?? I can't see the mark clearly 8)
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hello....... I would think it unlikely this is an C18 tumbler - this 'bird bath' base is typical of much later production. C18 glass tumblers were made by hand, and examples should show remains of either a pontil scar, or possibly a very large, shallow, depression where the scar was ground/polished and removed. Bases on earlier pieces were usually flat, and fairly consistent with a thickness of between a 1/4" and 1/2" thick, with a height of rarely more than about 4". This is, of course, a generalization, but does apparently seem to hold good for most tumblers.
I could be wrong entirely, but are you sure the panels are cut - they do have the appearance of moulded decoration.?
Regret I can't help with the base mark :)
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Looks like a phoenix rising from the flames to me too.
From the photo, the tumbler has the look of a pressed or moulded piece, and I suspect mid-to late 19th century rather than 18th century.
The mark, though, is not the phoenix mark of the The British Heat Resisting Glass Co. Ltd., Bilston, Staffs.whose products, under the brand name "Phoenix", were introduced in the 1930s and bore a strong resemblance to Jobling's “Pyrex” wares. See:
http://www.blackcountrymemories.org.uk/phoenix/phoenix01.htm
Might it be the mark of The Phoenix Glass Company, Monaca, Pennsylvania, USA, formed in 1880 (and which eventually became Anchor Hocking)? See
http://scripophily.net/phglco.html
Fred
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I feel sure it's a pressed tumbler, and I suspect from the last 20 - 30 years of the C19. Must admit I've not seen that many U.K. pressed examples from that period, but don't recollect anything with that sort of base mark, so would think it's not unreasonable to suggest it's from the States.
Pressed tumblers from their beginnings (around 1830's) and for a couple of decades or more, are sometimes recognizable by the constriction of width at the base of the inside. Apparently the punger was given a more pointed front end to assist with ease of pushing its way through the molten glass.........it seems flat ended pungers, understandably, needed a lot more effort.
Presumably they must have cracked the problem at some point, since later tumblers have flat bottomed insides.
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Hi
Thanks for all the helpful pointers. Yes, you are right, the tumbler must be pressed - got carried away there ! Had a pressed blue Victorian tumbler for years but it had a star base nothing like this one - no sign of restricted width inside, although it could be American. The mark is curious tho' - late 19thc you might expect the makers name to be there somewhere. All the best.
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whatever its origins it's a good genuine C19 tumbler and worth having in any collection. None of the States collectors have yet offered their advice on the mark - hopefully they will. The States were a little ahead of the Europe in the pressing game, and they may have had slightly different methods etc.
This is a good example to add to the Board's 'Glass Gallery Marks for future reference, so hope you can arrange at some time. :)
When similar decoration is cut (as opposed to pressed), you should be able to see some feint remains of the grinding wheel on the glass - most of the time no matter how careful the polishing, some slight evidence of those lines caused by the grit remain visible under strong light.
These lines will be at ninety degrees to the long axis of the tumbler.
U.K. published books on C19 drinking glasses (including tumblers) are almost non-existent, but John A. Brooks small booklet, despite running to only 32 pages, is well worth having. Title is 'Glass Tumblers - 1700 - 1900, and would imagine it's reasonably inexpensive.
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Hello
My 2 cents. If the concensus is that this is indeed late 19th century, then I would look at the UK or Europe. The practice of cutting a trade mark into the mould or plunger was much earlier there than the US. For example, Sowerby, Davidson and Greener were marking their glass ware in the 1870s while the first firms in the US to mark their glass consistently were Heisey and Northwood around 1900.
Sid
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it's not to say Sid that we couldn't be mistaken with our suggestion of dating, just that marks from our own backyard tend to be images that are known to someone on the Board here - U.K. pressed material has been studdied enough for it to be very difficult for a mark such as this to sneak by un-noticed till now. Re the possibility of this being States pressed glass, if this were a mark - even from a later period, then imagine you would probably have seen it, although appreciate that the quantity of small pressed factories your side was much greater than here.
utility tumblers can pick up a considerable amount of evident wear, often quicker than most other glass items - so there is the possibility this isn't as old as we might believe.
Can't find any evidence yet to suggest it's from the U.K. - so the Continent perhaps then. :)
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Hi
In response to Paul S's reply re the wear on the tumbler - I had already tried to explain the wear on the base as he does, a tumbler gets used a lot, but it is a key factor as you will know in trying to date a piece of glass. I am posting 2 pics here as a comparison - this is my moulded Irish decanter. [ pride & joy ! ] It is probably Waterford and definitely early 19thc, it is pictured in Westrupp's book Irish Glass a history, page 266 I believe. Now the wear to the base is the most wear on any piece of glass I have - had plenty of use ! - and so is the wear to the tumbler. I could push the date for the tumbler forward from the 1820 [ decanter's age ] to say 1860 or 70 - another 50 years of wear ! but NOT to the last few decades of the 19thc and certainly not into the 20thc [unless its been faked ! ] My instinct is it was made right here in Ireland. Could be wrong, very often am !!!
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Wear is only a factor; it is not definitive. Did anyone actually make pressed glass in Ireland?
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Hi ,
Now for my tuppence worth ,
The comparison of ware on one item of a known age to an another item of different form and unknown age is in my mind a very flawed method for many reasons,there are so many variables that have to be dealt with , ,if we take decanters they are much heavier than both glasses and tumblers especially when filled so one that has had a very busy life could be very worn indeed,your tumbler which I believe could possibly be late 19thc but more likely early 20thc or even later, especially with the base that it has, has possibly had a very hard life and showing ware to match but again for many reasons it could have achieved this in a far shorter time than your decanter.
So in short I don't think ware on any item is a guide to age , I have many 16th and 17th century pieces that show very little ware at all , but that's because of there weight and metal , not there age .
cheers ,
Peter.
oooop you beat me to it Christine,good question though ,an answer I dont have .
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must admit Peter, I'd not thought of using wear in the comparative sense to assess age on stylistically related objects - as you say, there are too many variables for that method to be reliable. However, I am a fan of wear, and would rather see some than look at an alleged C18 or C19 piece and see almost nothing - but that's just a hang up I have - perhaps engendered by the copyist age we live - when there's so many fakes around.
I'm going to quote from Andy McConnell's book, and from the section on 'Moulded Decanters'.................
This author speaks at some length on Charles Chubsee and his revival of moulded wares made in two and three part moulds, at the very beginning of the C19 - an addition to the glass industry that apparently had more influence in the States perhaps than the U.K. (re bottles and decanters). Apparently he'd been engaged in some industrial espionage in Bohemia on behalf of his Stourbridge employers, and when back in Stourbridge ....
"Chubsee moulds were used to produce a variety of cheap table glass. Moulded square and barrel pint decanters with combinations of pillars, flutes and diamonds approximating costliercut finishes were made in Britain, Ireland and the United States until the 1850's."
This doesn't offer any proof that the decanter posted here is from Ireland, just that the Irish did use this method to make decanters, and equally many very similar moulded decanters were produced in the States.
Can we ask please what the pontil area looks like, and what evidence, if any, of moulded seams.
But coming back to the wear issue............this feature really mustn't be used as a 'key factor' in determining age, however tempting.
When assessing age there are many features that combine to offer a possible answer - and we mustn't jump to conclusions based on personal wishes.
quote................."I have many 16th and 17th century pieces that show very little ware at all , but that's because of there weight and metal , not there age."..............
Another possible reason for lack of wear in this instance is value.........we do tend to be a little more careful with expensive things as opposed to pressed tumblers and moulded decanters.
My glass ceases to accumulate wear from the day I buy it - no point in risking damage to expensive pieces.
sorry I don't have Dudley Westropp's book :) - is it worth me getting please, it appears to be quite old?
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Hi ,
"Another possible reason for lack of wear in this instance is value.........we do tend to be a little more careful with expensive things as opposed to pressed tumblers and moulded decanters."
These "expensive things " when made were made to be used they were not made as collectors items only much later have they become this ,so when new would have been used albeit by well healed folks and I don't think ware is ever down to a lack of care, just everyday use .
" However, I am a fan of wear, and would rather see some than look at an alleged C18 or C19 piece and see almost nothing"
yes of course ware is important and should be there to a greater or lesser degree,the point I was trying to make in my usual long winded fashion was that heavy ware is not a reliable indicator of great age .
The decanter posted certainly looks to be as described by Sid, an early 19thc Irish mold blown decanter of typical form ,the mold used being a dip mold ,the decanter being blown out after visiting the mold , but those more familiar with decanters could reveal more, I have never really been a great fan so only have a couple ,yes Paul, that I use !!!! gasp!!! lol .
cheers ,
Peter.
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yes, I should have remembered that you use all of your glass Peter ;D
I didn't know that Sid had commented on the decanter ;)
I'm really am now unsure as to the age of the original tumbler posted here - both Sid and you appear to push the date of manufacture into the early part of the C20, perhaps. These bird bath bases were certainly around then. :-\
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Hi
You can get the Westrupp book - I think it dates from about 1930, - as a download pdf, free ! as it is out of print, wonderful bargain ! I think it is very good, the pictures are only black and white but nice and clear. He studied and collected the glass before it became fashionable and expensive and he tries to dispel a lot of myths going about at that time - Waterford glass could be identified by a blue tint for example, not the case at all. The export records he prints are staggering - glassware of every type going to every corner of the world. This is in the Georgian era, before the glass tax was reimposed. Very interesting.
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HI,
" I didn't know that Sid had commented on the decanter ;) "
Sorry my mistake ,should have been ,as described by rose de verre.
The answer to the date on this one is in the mark,hopefully someone will be able to identify it soon.
cheers ,
Peter.
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hi rose - thanks for the information on Westropp's book.........free is always good. :)
quote............."The export records he prints (Westropp) are staggering - glassware of every type going to every corner of the world." Couldn't believe it either.........I'm part way through an oldish U.S. book by N. Hundson Moore ('Old Glass European & American') - who quotes Westropp as having said "it's quite possibly there's more old Irish glass here (the U.S.) than there is in Ireland". Moore says "surely it can't all be broken". The export volumes are almost unbelievable.
quote.............."This is in the Georgian era, before the glass tax was reimposed."
I could be wrong but didn't think the Glass Excise Tax had been levied prior to 1825, in Ireland. The stumbling block for the Irish glass trade in the C18, apparently, were the import/export limitations imposed by the British government. Although the British Excise Act of 1746 levied a tax on the glass trade in Great Britain but not Ireland, the same Act did prohibit the importation of any glass into Ireland except from Great Britain, and prohibited the export of glass from Ireland..........so they were dead in the water, so to speak.
It appears that it was the War of Ind. that was the turning point which changed circumstances for the Irish, and their new found free trade combined with lifting of restrictions around 1780 created within a short time a boom in the glass trade, and they didn't look back -- at least until 1825 when the rot set in due to the heavy excise duty imposed by the British government - and the rest is histroy etc.
These taxes/duties were removed entirely in 1845, right across the board, but way too late to help.
sorry this is a bit long winded, but thought it might be of interest to those two or three people who collect Irish glass ;)
Ref. 'English, Scottish & Irish Table Glass' - G. Bernard Hughes - 1956 (Batsford).
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Hi,i think this is the same mark on this moulded shot glass,it must be a factory second with a sort of crazing on the inside and bits in the glass..
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It's not a second. The crazing is called crizzling http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glass_disease
and bits in the glass were normal. Standards for ordinary stuff were quite low, as waste was expensive and customer expectations didn't go much beyond functional.
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could be wrong, but the two marks don't look that similar...................admittedly this most recent pic lacks some definition, but there appear sufficient differences to need a 'second opinion' :) - can this second pic be sharpened up possibly?
I'd agree with the comments regarding the quality etc. of earlier pressed tumblers, although genuine crizzling may not be that common in tumblers.
We don't know size of this later piece, but it looks more like a tumbler than a shot glass. :)
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Not as clear as Rose's and i don't know if the next image is any better,either a bird on a nest or flames..sorry,7cm ht5 wd.
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you might try Canadian Rose's method of englarging the posted image.............. which is to place a lens/loupe between the camera and the object. It needs a little practice, but does provide some valuable magnification on small features such as this. With practise it's also possible to shove a microscope in the middle, and then you're really going places. ;D
I've just realized that rose de verre didn't include the size either, but now see why you call yours a shot glass.
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I'll try Paul,in the meantime Rose"s bird has a beak and eye with the head about the same level as the tip of the wings,on mine the head is higher than the wings and without an eye and a hint of a beak..