Randy769, I co-wrote the article Mick56 is sending you to. First, let me give you my Professional assurance that you don't need to be worried about bringing it into your house. No EXCAVATED cannonball has exploded just from being dropped -- even on a concrete floor. We relic-diggers have dug tens-of-thousands of cannonballs, and there is no news-report of one exploding from getting hit with the shovel during the digging-up process... nor from merely being dropped.
Additional reassurance:
The size-versus-weight ratio of your iron ball indicates it is a Solid one, not hollow. Your "rough" measurement of it as being 14-inches in Circumference is extremely close to a civil war era 12-Pounder caliber (4.62") cannonball (actual diameter 4.52-inches). Doing the math: the Circumference of a sphere is equal to its Diameter multiplied by Pi (3.1416)... so, 4.52" times 3.1416 equals 14.20-inches... which is only .2-inch larger than your rough measurement of the ball. As the "Solid Shot Essentials" article also says, you'll need to determine the ball's exact diameter (in hundredths-of-an-inch) after you remove all the dirt/rust-encrustation.
Household bathroom weighing-scales are notoriously inaccurate, but yours telling you that your ball weighs 11 pounds is slightly less than the prescribed 12 pounds 1-to-4 ounces weight of a 12-Pounder Solid Shot cannonball. We'll need you to weigh it on a precision Postal Shipping scale be sure about its actual weight, in pounds-&-ounces.
When you've gotten your iron ball's precise weight and precise diameter measured, we'll be able to tell with certainty whether it is a cannonball, or a Sports Shot Put ball, or a "Mill-Ball" (used to pulverize rocks in the Mining-&-Stonemilling Industry). We have to check the latter possibility, because there has historically been a LOT of mining-&-stonemilling in Southeastern Tennessee, where you live. Was there any civil war artillery activity at the location where you dug your iron ball?
