How to Identify Antique Bottles

Bottles Without Mold Seams

• 1

  Check bottle for mold seams. The earliest bottles were made by a glassblower using a blowpipe, and free-blown bottles will lack seams.

• 2

  Check for a pontil mark. A free-blown bottle will often exhibit a scar on its base from when the bottle was detached from the blowpipe (pontil).

• 3

  Check for bottle symmetry. If the bottle lacks mold seams but exhibits a high degree of symmetry, it may be dip- or turn-molded and probably dates before 1850.

Bottles With Mold Seams

• 4

  Check to see if seams go all the way from the base to the lip. If the seam disappears in the neck, then the bottle was probably "blown-in-mold," and dates circa 1800s to 1915.

• 5

  Note if bottle has seams that extend all the way to the lip. These are machine made and date from the early 20th century and later.

• 6

  Check for a "suction" scar on the base. Bottles with mold seams and suction scars are made in an Owens Automatic Bottle Machine and date after 1903. The Owens machine revolutionized the bottle industry, and made bottles very common objects.

Bottles with Labels and Embossed Lettering

• 7

  Check for embossed lettering. Embossed lettering can date prior to 1850, but most date to the late 19th century and later. Embossed lettering is especially common on patent medicine bottles that date from the mid-19th century through the early 20th century.

• 8

  Check for embossed lettering on the base. This often indicates the bottle manufacturer and will help date the bottle.

• 9

  Check for the following lettering: Federal Law Forbids Sale or Reusw of This Bottle. These are liquor bottles that date from 1935-1960s.

• 10

  Check for applied color labeling. These bottles date after 1940.