Ornate Ring from the Tavern Site

[paleomaxx]

Back again; I expanded my search of the surrounding area where the 1800's buttons and coins were buried. I've been finding a bunch of more contemporary coins, but fortunately also another 1808-1839 large cent so at least I'm still on the right track. I also found a very ornate ring that I was hoping you guys could help me date or even identify.



From the color of the light oxidation I'm nearly certainly it's silver, but there are no hallmarks or markings of any kind inside the band. The outside of the band has some very detailed designs which I tried my best to get good photos of. Has anyone seen a design like this before?

 

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[DCMatt]

Do a Google image search on 'mens filigree scroll ring'. You'll see some similar examples but I didn't see any exactly like yours. Many of them are listed as "vintage" - which means mid 20th C to me... Others were called "art deco" - which means early 20th C to me...

I don't get a sense that it is really old and with a split like that it doesn't seem to be a quality piece of jewelry. Maybe someone with a better eye for this sort of thing will chime it later.

Still a cool find. I'd clean it up and wear it.

DCMatt

 

[paleomaxx]

I certainly thought about wearing it, but it would have to be a pinky ring. This was definitely off someone with more delicate hands than mine

 

[mcl]

As DCMatt said, you can generally call that design pattern "filigree", though the rope-looking stuff on the top and bottom may also be referred to as "milgrain" in an internet search -- technically this would be a little large but you never know what people on the internet will call things. I would also agree with him that you will see that stuff on a lot of art deco jewelry.

That said, everything about this ring says "Etsy" piece to me. Unless you have a good reason to believe that no one might have lost it within the last 10 years (which you might, and in that case my opinion is irrelevant), I'm going with modern, because:

1) Milgrain and filigree have been very popular aesthetic elements of rings for at least the last ten years.

2) This ring style is called a "cuff ring", which is in vogue at the moment for women's fashion jewelry.

3) Clearly it was handmade and not by an artisan, as evidenced by the crude refinement of details near the split of the "cuff".

4) You said it was too small for anything but your pinky; unless you have big hands, this might mean it belonged to a woman. That's relevant since I don't believe the wide, flat band style was very popular as a women's fashion ring in e.g., art deco times. Could be wrong on that, just haven't ever seen a women's ring from that time period that matches this one, myself.

Just my thoughts. Like I said, if you're reasonably confident the site is isolated and has been for quite some time, then that would pretty much prove me wrong. Either way, the name of the style and the handmade part stand.

-mcl

 

[SkaBa]

Toe ring?

 

[NOLA_Ken]

Are the darker color circular bit sat the ends little rivets?

 

[paleomaxx]

Not rivets; they don't pass through. With a jeweler's loop I was able to see that the circular pieces are little dots of silver and the ends are capped with a rod of silver perpendicular to the rest of the band and it looks like both were brazed to the rest of the band. They then filed off any excess metal so it's flush with the rest and the weld is hidden.

I was also able to see how the whole piece was constructed. The base band is just a flat piece of silver with two wires of silver on either side. The wires have the braided design either brazed to the edge or carved into a flat flange. The braid is not twisted wire, just a carved flat piece that sits just over the top of the detailed filigree design in the center. The filigree is a separate piece that's held in by the side wires/braids. The whole things is held together by the brazed portions at the end of the cuffs. This is definitely a hand-made piece and some serious silver workmanship.

As for the site, it's very hard to get a contextual date. I found the large cent within 20 feet as well as an early 1800's buckle and a few other old pieces. I've also found a 1906 barber dime and a 1907 Indian Head cent. There's also two distributions of pennies. A concentration of 1940's wheat pennies and then 1970's Lincoln pennies. Pretty much everything has been 2-4 inches down though so no help from stratification.

One interesting note is that the barber dime and another 1964 silver dime I pulled out of the site where in perfect condition with no tarnish whatsoever, while this rings has moderate tarnish. It's definitely silver, but if the ground is so low in sulfur that the dimes didn't tarnish it could be either that the ring is a less hardy alloy of silver or it could suggest that it has been in the ground longer that the barber dime.

 

[Mintberrycrunch]

Great score on the barber and the Indian but the rings not silver looks like it was gold plated though