For the Colonial New England "relic" gurus...

[CTwoods]

For the Colonial New England "relic" guru's...

Scrambling to choose the best spot in case winter arrives; I went yesterday and today to a well known big cellar/mill, barn damsite on town property, 5 minutes from home.

There has been dug iron all over this huge site for decades, but I always find many non ferrous targets missed or ignored by the high tone Big Copper skimmers.

Late yesterday, I found this "burn pile" of bricks and charcoal. Don't know what it was, or how it got piled in two spots, but an inch or two down, got a broken Tombac...so it shows the entire site may be at least 1700s. Brought a clam rake and a 5" coil setup today, but the pile froze solid over night!

Tried to find a remote field across the road that shows as pasture in the 1934 Aerial Photo online. Never found "the old field", but the stonewalls looked better even farther out. Don't have a GPS to find my way back out so I went back to do a last run on the cellar side again.

Got this escutcheon at quitting time. Figured it would be a factory stamped brass sheet type from somewhere in the last part of 1800's, until I cleaned it. Took a few minutes to spot the design of the two side flowers were not the same, then realized it is totally handmade and a tube shape punch was used to make two sizes of circles, and the half circles by holding the punch crooked.

I sanded it to bring out the detail and it is not brass; I think it is a Tombac type zinc alloy, as it is not a yellow brass color, nor a copper color.

two nail heads are rusted in place. I suppose it could be for furniture, but I am thinking a small lock-box for sugar, coffee or tobacco? IDK

No idea how to date it, but it must be colonial IMO, and could go way back as the site is within 2 miles of the original 1670 village

I have two unusual whatzits from the burnpile that I will clean and post later in ID.

I was having a pretty downer day till I got home to clean my stuff. I am pretty happy with this find

 

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[CRUSADER]

The broken tombac button is circa 1790s & the keyhole looks late 18th C as well. If not its early 1800s.

 

[CTwoods]

The broken tombac button is circa 1790s & the keyhole looks late 18th C as well. If not its early 1800s.

Thank you for your reply, and the fact that you are from the "mother country" of England.

As far as the overall lock plate design shape, with hand made perforations and hand stamped designs; can there be any hints to it's origin of England or America? I cannot yet find any small similar handmade decorative pieces on searches so far, but the style of stamped flower petals done with a tilted punch, might be on some early large Dandy buttons?

Hand decorated pieces are very rarely found here, so that is why it is a very important find for me. If we get some sun, I will try to figure out what material it could be made from. It was 100 feet from the burned piles, but the burn piles were definitely moved. So, it possibly could be burned brass with an altered surface color?

 

[CASPER-2]

a large percentage of your/our fancy dandy buttons are supposedly Dutch made and may come from the Hudson river valley areas
so plate may be from the same

 

[CRUSADER]

Thank you for your reply, and the fact that you are from the "mother country" of England.

As far as the overall lock plate design shape, with hand made perforations and hand stamped designs; can there be any hints to it's origin of England or America? I cannot yet find any small similar handmade decorative pieces on searches so far, but the style of stamped flower petals done with a tilted punch, might be on some early large Dandy buttons?

Hand decorated pieces are very rarely found here, so that is why it is a very important find for me. If we get some sun, I will try to figure out what material it could be made from. It was 100 feet from the burned piles, but the burn piles were definitely moved. So, it possibly could be burned brass with an altered surface color?

I've not seen that shape, but had many 18th C furniture keyholes with that type of punch design. Many are found on Tnet in the US & Canada from 18th C Sites.
Normally they are brass, highly likely British.

 

[CTwoods]

a large percentage of your/our fancy dandy buttons are supposedly Dutch made and may come from the Hudson river valley areas
so plate may be from the same

I've not seen that shape, but had many 18th C furniture keyholes with that type of punch design. Many are found on Tnet in the US & Canada from 18th C Sites.
Normally they are brass, highly likely British.

Thanks for the information on the plate and Dandy buttons. Every piece of info on artifacts is helpful.

 

[CTwoods]

Normally they are brass, highly likely British.

I just did a test on the back, with a pointed half round jewelers file, and it is not brass. I have to assume it must be pewter..

....which lead me to search pewter on the net:

one site Quote : ". A European pewter sheet would contain 92% tin, 2% copper, and 6% antimony. "

---so it could be made of a sheet of pewter, not cast, as it is not thick enough.



... then I also found a site with info on where the pewter might have come from: Quote: "Lead. One of the metals that may be alloyed with tin to create pewter. Because there were no tin mines in this country, the only source of tin for 18th century American pewterers was scrap English pewter, melted down and adulterated with lead."



logic says that this keyhole probably was not made in America from "re-melted English pewter", but I suppose there might have been sheet pewter available from England, for craftsmen in America, but that seems unlikely to me. So I think you are correct in that it is likely an English piece, either from an English wooden item, or an imported decoration for American wood cabinetmaker.



Pretty fascinating to me, to learn all this stuff from a piece of metal dug at an old site. That's why I do prefer relics, versus "just wanting old coins".

 

[trapperart]

Nice finds congrats

 

[CTwoods]

Nice finds congrats

Thanks, and some research kinda spurred on by Crusader...the item seems to be getting nicer

I tried searching this time for "pewter keyhole", and stumbled upon the Colonial Williamsburg Excavated Artifact" page. No, theirs are not pewter, but the stamped designs on several items are very similarly done with round hollow punches and the long sweeping outline curves. One was dated 1690-1710. They called another one of the stampings: " crude floral ornament of common style. This type of plate was common in the period c.1690-1730."

I will ad the page link; you early relic guys need to look at ALL the various metal and non metal artifacts, that could help date some finds, or even ID a find. It won't be a letdown when you scroll what they found!...buttons, gunparts, you name it..

Anthony Hay House (NB) Archaeological Report Vol. III Part I, Block 28 Building 71 Lot 263-264 | Colonial Williamsburg Digital Library

Here are their two pics, to compare, as well as my find pic. Look at stamping on item 1 and 6 on the first, then items 1 and 2 on second pic. Any thoughts?

 

[CRUSADER]

I would find it hard to believe its pewter.

 

[CTwoods]

I would find it hard to believe its pewter.

OK, I'm working on it after what you say. I filed the back test spot wider and it looks like the color of filed mild steel, but if I turn it just right in bright sun, I may be seeing a faint hint of very weak yellow. I will wet sand the smooth back to see more clean area.

But... In sun, I now see from the backside, that it is definitely cast. I cast small things and I am familiar of the necessary radii of the details in the bottom of the mold itself, and how to tell which side was down, in the mold. The back was in the bottom of the mold. That would be assuming it was a simple open mold to pour into. It's a bit thicker than a One Reale and seems most of it is a bit thinner than a US dime

 

[johnnyblaze]

I think it's home made for a lock box or chest..Possibly coin silver..They could have made it and mixed up a bit of tin but it's screaming coin silver to me.
Also look at all the plates in the pics..They are all even in design and yours was clearly made on site..

~Blaze~

 

[FreeBirdTim]

Could be silver plated brass. Silver plating is very thin nowadays, but back then it was much thicker. I found a silver plated colonial shoe buckle a couple of years ago and the silver plating was very thick. So filing a little bit may not expose the brass that might be underneath the silver plating.

I would test the filed spot with nitric acid. That will help to determine if it's silver or silver plated.

 

[CRUSADER]

OK, I'm working on it after what you say. I filed the back test spot wider and it looks like the color of filed mild steel, but if I turn it just right in bright sun, I may be seeing a faint hint of very weak yellow. I will wet sand the smooth back to see more clean area.But... In sun, I now see from the backside, that it is definitely cast. I cast small things and I am familiar of the necessary radii of the details in the bottom of the mold itself, and how to tell which side was down, in the mold. The back was in the bottom of the mold. That would be assuming it was a simple open mold to pour into. It's a bit thicker than a One Reale and seems most of it is a bit thinner than a US dime

Some kind of copper-alloy like brass (sometimes plated) is normal, & steel is possible.

 

[johnnyblaze]

Some kind of copper-alloy like brass (sometimes plated) is normal, & steel is possible.

Steel!!Your kidding right?

 

[CRUSADER]

Steel!!Your kidding right?

Nope, but can't find the iron or steel type ones I thought I had, must be going mad. Its more likely than pewter.

 

[johnnyblaze]

It's coin silver made custom..Even high quality pewter spoons and forks need iron reinforcement embedded in them to hold..
It would never work on a relic like this and survive..The only reason it had crud stuck to it is it was probably subjected to a fire or heat allowing it to stick..
Colonial steel Cru that's a good one

~Blaze~

 

[CTwoods]

Steel!!Your kidding right?

Don't be so harsh LOL... When I started cleaning it with dry emory sandpaper on the night that I found it, I swear that the sanded front face looked "exactly" like a rusted mild steel item. I restore 80-100 year old rusty antique cars, and I thought I knew what metal this was. But Crusader was correct when he said "pewter is unlikely".


Ok, I will make the archeologists angry, but I used 3 grades of wet sandpaper, followed by Ajax/Comet powder on a wet rag, then toothpaste on a rag, then rubbed it forever on the knee of my jeans It is yellow brass, but hard to get a good pic with what I have. I can't cut any deeper without loosing the hand stamped details, so it still has dark spots.

I saw no signs of silver. It had a nasty thick crust of corrosion material? The 120 grit paper was a bit dangerous, but the finer grit sandpaper would not cut through the layer of crud.

This thing looks really old to me. I want to think it could date to the earliest times of my town. I am thinking of what the Williamsburg site called "crude floral design", so I suppose English imports would have been a much better quality? IDK I guess it could be made here, but I doubt I will ever know.


Thanks for everyone's input on this item. I'm sure glad I found it, as it was very late in the last day of our season before the freeze-up. This was the 2nd to last thing I dug there.

 

[sutphin]

INTERESTING FIND MR WOOD , AND TOMBAC ALSO...

 

[CRUSADER]

Don't be so harsh LOL... When I started cleaning it with dry emory sandpaper on the night that I found it, I swear that the sanded front face looked "exactly" like a rusted mild steel item. I restore 80-100 year old rusty antique cars, and I thought I knew what metal this was. But Crusader was correct when he said "pewter is unlikely".


Ok, I will make the archeologists angry, but I used 3 grades of wet sandpaper, followed by Ajax/Comet powder on a wet rag, then toothpaste on a rag, then rubbed it forever on the knee of my jeans It is yellow brass, but hard to get a good pic with what I have. I can't cut any deeper without loosing the hand stamped details, so it still has dark spots.

I saw no signs of silver. It had a nasty thick crust of corrosion material? The 120 grit paper was a bit dangerous, but the finer grit sandpaper would not cut through the layer of crud.

This thing looks really old to me. I want to think it could date to the earliest times of my town. I am thinking of what the Williamsburg site called "crude floral design", so I suppose English imports would have been a much better quality? IDK I guess it could be made here, but I doubt I will ever know.


Thanks for everyone's input on this item. I'm sure glad I found it, as it was very late in the last day of our season before the freeze-up. This was the 2nd to last thing I dug there.

Not sure when your area dates to, but even old stuff gets moved into newer areas. The is a chance, because the general shape does look like what we call the William & Mary period piece, date its earlier than I first thought, ie 1690-1730, but for now I think 18th C as a broad date is safer.