Copper Plated Lead Disc from Colonial House (WII004)

[Erik in NJ]

I dug this several weeks ago at the colonial house that has produced so many nice coins and relics. Here's yeat another nice relic that upon clean-up (as a pleasant surprise) revealed an original copper or gold plating. Base metal appears to be lead. No marking on it on either side and it's symmetrical. Not sure if it's a poker chip, weight, or what. It weighs exactly 2.54 oz.

Any ideas on this one? Thanks!

 

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[yaxthri]

This is clearly a backgammon game piece to me...

 

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[DCMatt]

This is clearly a backgammon game piece to me...

Interesting possibility... I looked for metal backgammon checkers on the net and they are out there. No antique ones that I found but I did find an antique board/case made of hammered brass. It did not have original checkers with it.

The seller of the brass case said it weighs 5 - 6 pounds. Plus 30 pieces at 2.5 oz each that makes for a 10+ pound backgammon set. That seems excessive to me...

DCMatt

 

[Erik in NJ]

This is clearly a backgammon game piece to me...

Thanks for your post. It certainly has the look and feel of an antique gaming piece.

 

[Erik in NJ]

Hi Matt, Taz, et al. I got home too late last night to be able to photograph the sides of the item--sorry this has been a hectic week for me. I will try to do it this evening. If it helps the edge is appox. 1/4" thick and rounded. I am leaning towards game piece, but due to the geometry, similar pieces like this would probably not be "ideal" candidates for being stacked (as with checkers or poker chips) as it's quite smooth and rounded everywhere--though they could be. As I mentioned both sides of the item are the same. Nothing seems to be broken off anywhere.

I'll clean it further if anyone has any suggestions as to how to remove the remaining "stuff." I have used soap and water with a toothbrush, a bit of a bath in ACV, and some treatments with Aluminum Jelly.

 

[taz42o]

Hi Taz! Thanks for jumping in--you and Matt are both great at this research! I'll take some pics on an angle. I think the aestetics are such that the disc is too thick for a plate to a miniatute tea set--it just wouldn't look right as it's too chunky. The indentation on the disc is on both sides and it goes into the disc.

Yea I thought at 2.54 Oz It might be to thick for toy saucer. I dont know what it is.

 

[Erik in NJ]

I am really starting to lean towards the backgammon piece (thanks yaxthri!). I see they made/make entire furniture quality backgammon tables so 10 lb. of gaming pieces might be much for a portable set, but for a furniture quality table I think it would be reasonable. It's about the right size for a backgammon table. I do see that they make pewter chess pieces, so it's reasonable that pewter backgammon pieces were made especially in the days before bakelite etc. By the other finds on this site I'd guess this piece is early to mid-1800s. The only other thing I can think of would be a piece to another type of game, but I have no clue at this point what that might be.

 

[yaxthri]

Well "portable" never cossed my mind...
I have seen chess games, half pieces copper, half brass or bronze...

Ok I have another theory if backgammon was not too popular in your area an d you think the pieces could not be stacked, maybe a "Nine Man Morris" game piece?

 

[Erik in NJ]

Well "portable" never cossed my mind...
I have seen chess games, half pieces copper, half brass or bronze...

Ok I have another theory if backgammon was not too popular in your area an d you think the pieces could not be stacked, maybe a "Nine Man Morris" game piece?

I am in the northeast in northern NJ in a predominantly Dutch settled area. There obviously was quite a bit of English influence as well so I would gress that backgammon was probably a popular parlor game in those days of old. This is a piece that probably came from an expensive set and the homestead I found it on was owned by a family of means back in the 1700s. I would green check the thread, but just want to provide the edge pics I promised and see if anyone can find a similar piece on the internet. Thanks again for your direction on the gaming piece. I'll take a closer look at it tonight with a 10x jeweler's loupe for any markings, but there doesn't seem to be any on this piece.

 

[302guy]

I remembered reading this " Coin Hoard Recovery Technique "when I saw that..

"Out of being superstitious, a person who buried a cache would also place a Cache-Protector (obereg), usually an iron padlock or door bolt, sometimes a small or pectoral icon made of bronze or copper, on top of the cache. In medieval times, it was believed that a Cache-Protector would prevent the treasure from being discovered by others.
Ironically, a few centuries later, the iron cache-protector of a large size has become a true protector against any metal detector: it fools the machine by masking the loot buried underneath as if it is an iron object. It happens even after the cache-protector had been moved a little by the plow.
Unless the cache-protector had been moved further away from the treasure by field plowing, the cache would be missed by an inexperienced treasure hunter. It is wise to scan the entire area of the coin-spread with a metal detector set up in All Metal Mode and on highest Sensitivity in order to retrieve all iron targets from the spot, possibly find the iron obereg and then hear the faint signal coming from the coin cache itself."

 

[HollandsBrook]

Erik did you ever figure this out? I'm in Central NJ in a town also settled by the Dutch and dug a similar lead disc of the exact same weight as yours. I also dug it near a colonial homesite.

Only mine has some mysterious holes in it. Take a look: http://www.treasurenet.com/forums/what/443991-6-years-later-i-still-dont-know-what.html