๐Ÿฅ‡ BANNER AMAZING .... Intact 1680s bottle pulled from early trash pit!!

Bill D. (VA)

Silver Member
Oct 7, 2008
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On Saturday my buddies Stan and KMac invited me to make a return trip to our favorite early colonial pit without our friend Dan who unfortunately had scheduling issues. We picked up where we were digging last time which was an area absolutely loaded with debris down to almost the 4 foot level. Huge oyster shells were packed in tight along with plenty of brick, bone and early glass making for very difficult digging. We were all dying to get our hands on a few more wine bottle seals, but they were quite elusive in spite of the heavy concentration of black glass. One interesting observation was the very early bottle shapes that were being recovered, many of which represented late 1600s shaft-and-globe-to-onion transitional varieties. Near the end of the dig KMac decided to take a short break and invited me to jump in and dig in the little hotspot heโ€™d been working. It wasnโ€™t more than 5 min later while removing material from the very bottom of the hole when I stumbled across an amazing find, and one that I unfortunately damaged with the shovel. It turned out to be a complete example of a small, but heavy wine bottle that was similar in form to many of the other large fragments we had been digging. In one of my reference books I found a nearly identical example dating to the 1680s which is spot-on for this shape. I told KMac this was his bottle, but he very graciously insisted that it belonged to me. What a wonderful gesture and friend!! I really felt bad taking it, but he sincerely wanted me to have it. Iโ€™ll never forget that moment โ€“ thank you again KMac! The bottle had some lip damage and we meticulously sifted the dirt in search of the small missing pieces, but came up just a little short of finding them all. I had a blast and canโ€™t wait to go back with my good friends and see what other amazing treasures await.
 

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Upvote 111

Tnmountains

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Wow. This is the second nice bottle dig I have seen posted today.That is old and like crusader said I would think most examples are in the water. Nice rescue.
 

jeff of pa

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Dec 19, 2003
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Very Nice Bottle :notworthy:
 

toasted

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Jun 1, 2015
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Banner vote from me. Precious metals or rare early colonial always does it for me
 

OutdoorAdv

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Fantastic Bill :notworthy: Its pretty incredible you finally got one intact. I've noticed lots of bases and necks in your trips there... you guys ever try to see if any from the same section fit together? You absolutely got my vote on this bottle :icon_thumleft:
 

Scrappy

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Mar 6, 2014
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Fantastic job Bill (Stan, and Kmac)! Iโ€™ve only dug little pieces of necks and bottoms of onion bottles, so the thought of a complete one is almost unfathomable. And you sure have some incredible and generous digging buddies. My banner vote is going in, and I hope you have many more blessings in the future buddy.
 

OP
OP
Bill D. (VA)

Bill D. (VA)

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Oct 7, 2008
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I would think this would be a stupendous feat even for the diggers in Europe. The fact alone that you all have been digging those pits for years and this is one of the only whole ones to come out shows how rare a whole 17th century bottle is to dig. This isn't a run of the mill onion bottle either.
Congratulations you hard working, dedicated SOB.

We still haven't finished working the hotspot where the bottle came from so no telling what else might show up. Stay tuned ....
 

redcobra8u

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Jan 24, 2014
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Man I want to help! Congrats!
 

metalev4

Bronze Member
Aug 12, 2006
1,165
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You certainly deserve it with all the dirt moved over the last quarter century. That is an incredible recovery and definitely top 5 in your collection which is monumental given all the rare finds. Canโ€™t wait to see it in person this spring! A banner if there ever was one.
 

DocBeav

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Jul 8, 2012
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Amazing Bill! Congrats! You guys worked for that one!
 

Tom_in_CA

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Mar 23, 2007
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Congratz on banner. I'm not much of a bottle digger, but ... from what I hear .... it's extremely hard to find intact bottles from this era (the "blown glass" era, etc....). Because at that time, they'd have used the jars/glass over and over and over. Unlike the "disposable" mindset of later years.
 

pepperj

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It looks very nice up there Bill, congrats on the Banner and the recovery.
 

Valley Ranger

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Nice save Bill - congratulations on the banner find!
 

OP
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Bill D. (VA)

Bill D. (VA)

Silver Member
Oct 7, 2008
4,711
6,212
SE Virginia
๐Ÿฅ‡ Banner finds
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๐Ÿ† Honorable Mentions:
2
Detector(s) used
F75 SE (land); CZ-21 (saltwater)
Primary Interest:
Other
Thanks to everyone who took the time to submit a banner vote. I'm still in shock about recovering this incredible and very early bottle, and it's one more off the slowly shrinking bucket list. We still have a ways to go in digging out our little hotspot so no telling what might pop out next. I appreciate all the nice comments as well, except for Joey that is .... ha!
 

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