Topic: Bristol Blue decanter, late 19thC?

[Tigerchips]

Just over 11 inches high, polished pontil, and plenty of wear.

[Paul S.]

always an attractive colour, and good looking piece  -  do we think it should be called a perpendicular cylinder?    Is there any particular reason this should be labelled as late C19 - is there a reference example in a book somewhere? 
According to McConnell, this general shape was popular 1840 - 1860, often as part of the Gothic Revival, though not sure the stopper here could be called Gothic - perhaps the stopper has more of a C20 look.               Are there any matching Nos.?

The neck adornment appears to show a nod toward a string ring perhaps.

Sorry, regret I've no thoughts on a positive date or id  -  this blue seems to pop up at various times  -  let's hope someone will have the answer, but it is a good looking bottle

P.S.      might be worth having a look - if you can find them - at some of the Hill-Oustons's repro designs from the 1920/30 period  ……..   they certainly knocked out a lot of B.B. material covering all types of table glass, including decanters, based on historic shapes etc.

[Tigerchips]

Looks like a forgot the actual date the polished pontil was first used. Seems to be 1834 when they started using it. There are no marks at all.

[glassobsessed]

Looks like a Serving bottle. If so would have contained spirits, maybe gin, for use at the table.

John

[Paul S.]

quote  -   "perhaps the stopper has more of a C20 look."          obviously it pays to put specs. on in the morning, which would discount my suggestion of a decanter, unless of course there is wear inside the neck.   
Not sure I follow the comments about 1834 -  is the suggestion that this was when polished pontil depressions were first used?          I had thought this was a practice dating back to the C18.

obviously I've led too sheltered a life, and although serving bottles for the table for wine are reasonably common, I was unaware of the same thing for gin.

[glassobsessed]

I tend to assume that wine would be served in a clear glass vessel (to see the colour of the wine) but no idea if that is more of a modern practice.

[Tigerchips]

I got 1834 from this website... https://sha.org/bottle/pontil_scars.htm

"2. Some early 19th century bottles - particularly decorative bottles intended to be kept indefinitely - were often fire polished as the final step in the production process.  Fire polishing was reported to have been developed by the English in 1834, though some American flasks from an earlier period appear to have been fire polished."

No wear on the inside rim, in fact there's a very thin rim running around it, i doubt a glass stopper would fit well.

[Ekimp]

Bickerton’s Eigtheenth Century Drinking Glasses gives the fourth quarter of the 18th century ‘about 1775’ as the time when cutting and polishing techniques had improved, facilitating faceted stems and ground out pontil scars (in drinking glasses).

[Paul S.]

as always with multiple input there's a problem with getting sidetracked  -  as with any attempt at dating, it's usually the case that there's a need for maximum features with positive definable dating characteristics, before leaping into a particular era.        IMHO, polished pontil depressions are a tad too vague, and Bristol blue has been around since the Romans, apparently.           But it's the 'string ring' that seems out of place here - assuming that's what's on the neck  -  they've not been on bottles for several centuries - so assuming this item is a  serving bottle than presumably the ring is purely decorative and not made for use.
This one may well have been made as a table serving bottle for spirits, but looking at examples of blue spirit bottles they appear, usually, as bulbous shapes or as spirit squares.
The Bohemians and Germans drank their Rhenish stuff from green or red glasses and made coloured bottles, and perhaps in the U.K., as suggested, we used clear bottles as Brits. preferred red wine (picture of a clear bottle attached - probably first half C20 -  it's a perpendicular cylinder decanter and not a serving bottle -  as it has the No. 46 on the pouring rim, but came without a stopper).

But who knows  -  this is an attractive bottle but with an elusive birth date, unless we can find some corroboration in the form of a known datable example for comparison.            Dating this one is all the more problematic as there seem to be very few examples of serving bottles compared to decanters with stoppers, of which there are very many, and blue ones even more rare  -  if pushed I'd go for either a repro item from the 1920/30s, or back nearer the middle of the C19 - wear on serving bottles can seem disproportionate if they're used most days for half a century, or if you're a lush

[Ekimp]

In Miller’s glass Antiques Checklist, under British and Irish Decanters, Coloured Decanters, it says ‘English coloured examples date from around 1810 and were made to hold spirits’. It goes on to say ‘Prince Albert’s influence led to an interest in German white wines, and a market for attractive serving bottles developed. Produced from around 1850, these decanters followed the tall, narrow shape of Hock wine bottles. First made in single colours...’