Antique Bottles >

-----------Please note some links will direct you to external sites. ----------

9cd171

Three Antique Medicine Bottles - photo from Wikimedia Commons

The oldest and rarest of antique bottles command prices of tens of thousands of dollars. Finding one that is worth that kind of money can be hard work however as some of the best ones are found beneath the surface and are obscure because they are filled with and covered with mud and debris. After carefully cleaning your bottle you may find a crack or worse that will diminish the value of your treasure.

There are all types of bottles that are interesting and have value. Possibly the most commonly collected are apothecary bottles used by druggist and pharmacists, antique medicine bottles like those pictured to the left from the "snake oil" days, and soft drink bottles. Also known to command extremely high prices at auctions and sales to serious collectors are bitters bottles.

Bottle Colors

Antique Bottles have a wide range of colors other than clear that are caused by the various ingredients used in the process of making the glass for the bottle. Colors include, Aqua Blue, Aqua Green, Cobalt (light, medium, and dark), Teal, Peacock Blue, Deep Amethyst, Puce (Burgandy, Pink, Deep Copper, Plum, Strawberry, and Ruby), Black, Green (Medium, Emerald, Deep Emerald, Lockport Green, Deep Teal, Citron, Deep Citron, and Deep Olive,) Yellow (Olive Amber, Yellow Olive Green, Brilliant Yellow, Golden Yellow, Yellow Amber, Honey Amber, Medium Amber, and Reddish Amber).

To achieve the multitude of colors, ingredients ranging from common salt to gold are used. Bohemian Granite and copper are used to produce greens. Gold, Iron and Copper are some of the ingredients used to produce red glass. An impure oxide of cobalt, Zaffer and copper are used to produce blue glass. Yellow glass is produced from silver, iron, antimony and magnesia with tartar. Combinations of various ingredients above produce the purple, amber and other non-primary colors. Black glass is produced using Zaffer, magnesia copper and iron while Opaque white glass is produced using horns, bones, calcined tin and sometimes common salt.

Places to Dig for Bottles
Antique Bottles can be found in old abandoned houses, dumps, and although it sounds disgusting, in the area of old outhouses. Don't worry, the part you are worried about has turned to rich soil by now, but be sure to wear protective clothing and gloves.

There is even a thread regarding outhouses on this Wiki, so you might find a few hints here, "When there was outhouses...".

Cleaning bottles can be quite time consuming and although the mud and grit will usually remove with warm soapy water or after a good soak, some stains are resistant to removal. Check the sources listed below for some great tips on bottle cleaning.

We hope you have enjoyed this blurb regarding Antique Bottles and that you will share your finds and tips with us.

Sources

Images on this page are from Wikimedia Commons, members Dancingflowers and Grlnastang. The content was compiled from various sources including the following:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2250241_old-bottle-dumps-bottle-structures.html

http://www.antiquebottles.com/

One of our members, PaulSales has a really nice collection: http://www.bertaut.com/sunkentreasure.html

The image below is from member Grlnastang.

Places to Learn & Find More on this site
__________________________________
An alphabetical list of other main categories on our site

All Things Lapidary
Classified Ads

Clubs and Orgainzations

Educational Guides

Events Calendar

Field Trip Dates

Getting Started - How to Create a Page
Great Treasure Museums

Home Page

Lost Treasures
National Directories

Nuggets of News
Rockhounding for Dummies
Treasure Hunting

Treasure Hunting Vacations

Trip Reports

What's Rockin'
Your & Our Treasure Hunter Profiles

Your Profile Page
(The link above will open the home page, on upper right, you will need to click on "My Profile" , then "Profile" to get to your page. The "My Profile" link is available from any page.)
Your RMM Finds

gamaliel114	Latest page update: made by gamaliel114 , Oct 15 2009, 8:00 PM EDT (about this update About This Update Edited by gamaliel114 17 words added 12 words deleted view changes - complete history)
	Keyword tags: Antique Bottles More Info: links to this page

Threads for this page

AngelaMae

When there was Out Houses.. (page: 1 2 3)

May 8 2009, 11:16 PM EDT by jakesrocks

Thread started: Jan 19 2008, 12:34 PM EST Watch

If I was 80 yrs old, and used an out house(s) my whole life, (no indoor bathroom) I imagine the structure(s) would have a storie to tell, for a person interested in hearing it. Weird?

2 out of 3 found this valuable. Do you?

Keyword tags: