Pewter or Tombac Button?

[ripvanb]

Hi - This is the first button I’ve found that looks like this. I was thinking maybe it was either pewter or tombac. Any info on it would be much obliged. Also what’s a good way to clean it better, I’ve been lightly using a toothpick on it.

 

[TheCannonballGuy]

Yes, a tombac... more specifically, a White-Tombac (silvery brass) button which was spun on a lathe. Tombac is a version of brass which contains about 80 percent copper and 20% zinc. Adding just 1% of Arsenic (which is a metal) to the molten alloy changes the metal's color from golden-ish brass to silvery. Your spun-back White Tombac button dates from the latter-1700s into the very-early 1800s. See the button-dating chart, attached below... but note, I disagree with the chart's very short (15-year) time range for spun-back Tombac buttons.

Canada manufactured Standard (golden-ish) Tombac 5-cent coins during World War 2. Here are photos showing the 5-cent 1942 Tombac, and a 1998 White-Tombac coin from Romania.

 

[ANTIQUARIAN]

I agree with TheCannonballGuy, tombac metal.
If you wash your button, it'll clean up shiny as a babies bottom.

Nice find,
Dave

 

[ripvanb]

Thanks for the detailed info! So it’s ok to use water on it? I was going to use a q-tip and a little warm water.

 

[ripvanb]

It has no lathe marks on the back and shows little shine to it like other dug tombacs I’ve seen on here. It’s also pretty heavy and flakes a little on the edges. That’s why I thought pewter at first.