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How Do I Identify Pottery?

  • 23-09-2017 11:02am
    #1
    mikefoxo
    Registered Users Posts: 458 ✭✭


    Farmers son here. Did a bit of ploughing earlier on in the year and came across a few different bit of pottery while I was picking stones. Most of it is probably from the last hundred years but some bits look interesting, one piece is very thick too which is a little different. Is there an online resource that would help me identify how old they are?


Comments

  • #2
    Arsemageddon
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,129 ✭✭✭Arsemageddon


    mikefoxo wrote: »
    Farmers son here. Did a bit of ploughing earlier on in the year and came across a few different bit of pottery while I was picking stones. Most of it is probably from the last hundred years but some bits look interesting, one piece is very thick too which is a little different. Is there an online resource that would help me identify how old they are?

    Post some pictures here or in the archaeology forum and I might be able to identify it for you. Try and get the pics to show what the interior of the sherd looks like i.e. The bit between the inner and outer surfaces. It would be useful If you could also put a one euro coin in the picture to give an idea of the size of the sherd.


  • #3
    mikefoxo
    Registered Users Posts: 458 ✭✭mikefoxo


    Here are pictures of two different pieces.
    Picture 1&2 : It's flat with no curve to it; quite a thick piece; there's "glazing" on the top of it aswell so it must be from the top of whatever it's from; two raised parallel sections on it; appears to be 3 distinct "interior sections"

    Pictures 3&4 : Curved piece; dull white colour; again fairly thick; appears to be just one material, in one layer if you know what I mean


  • #4
    mikefoxo
    Registered Users Posts: 458 ✭✭mikefoxo


    Final piece that might be of interest. Black glazing on the inside; appears to be the rim; nice deep indentation on the outside; a lighter shade of clay than the other piece


  • #5
    pedroeibar1
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5,108 ✭✭✭pedroeibar1


    Guessing - probably Victorian era baked clay land drains. Was that land formerly part of a big estate?


  • #6
    mikefoxo
    Registered Users Posts: 458 ✭✭mikefoxo


    Do you mean the white piece? It was part of an estate (like most places I guess) but we're in quite a hilly area and I doubt if there was ever any drains put in


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  • #7
    Arsemageddon
    Closed Accounts Posts: 2,129 ✭✭✭Arsemageddon


    The first 2 pics look like some kind of tile, either a roof or a floor. Probably nineteenth century.

    The white fragment looks like it's from some kind off vessel, my first impression is that it is from a chamber pot. The sherd is quite chunky, and chamber pots were often made this way so that they wouldn't break if dropped (eww, yucky!). It could also be from a large storage jar. Again, it's probably nineteenth century.

    The last sherd looks like its from a black ware vessel, which was the poor mans domestic pottery in the eighteenth & nineteenth century in Ireland.


  • #8
    mikefoxo
    Registered Users Posts: 458 ✭✭mikefoxo


    No gold this time, I'll have to keep digging :D


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