Written by the Treasureguide for the exclusive use of the Treasure Beaches Report.
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| Marsden's Carminative Syrup Bottle in Current Sedwick Auction. |
The past couple of days I showed 1715 Fleet ingots that are listed in the current Sedwick treasure auction. I thought I'd show another type of treasure today. This one is not unlike some of the bottles I've found and show in TGBottleBarn.blogspot.com, but it already has a bid of $160. You might ask why. There are a few reasons. First it is a nice bottle, but that by itself wouldn't make it that valuable. What makes it more valuable is the origin, which is the S. S. Republic, and the fact that it is being sold for the benefit of the 1715 Fleet Society.
Below is the lot description.
Marsden's Carminative Syrup (New York) glass bottle, ex-S.S. Republic (1865). 310 grams. 7¼" x 2¼" x 1¾". Light green glass bottle with "Marsden's," "Carminative Syrup," and "New York" embossed vertically on three sides, original cork punched into the bottle, displayed on an attractive wooden stand with plaque. The former contents were touted as an herbal remedy for intestinal gas and flatulence. From the S.S. Republic (1865), with original certificate from the salvors and small wooden stand with plaque. SOLD FOR THE BENEFIT OF THE 1715 FLEET SOCIETY.
It is lot 1638, if you want to bid.
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There are a variety of bottles in the auction and other artifacts in the auction. There are more bottles and some porcelain and other things.
On the topic of bottles, many bottles from this general age period have been found on the Treasure Coast. I've shown a number of those. Among those are numerous pharmacy and medicine bottles.
Pharmacy bottles often show symbols that you might not understand at first glance. Below is one of those sumbols..
℥
Do you know what it means? It is an ounce symbol.
Here is a photo of one on a graduated pharmacy bottle that I found.
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| Symbols Below the Shoulder of a Graduated Pharmacy Bottle. |
The first symbol indicates ounces. So the symbols indicates that the contents of this bottle should be 2 ounces.
Apothecaries' symbols commonly found in medical recipes
Some of those symbols derive from as early as the Middle Ages. Besides being used by pharmacists, these symbols are used in other contexts, such as alchemy and metallurgy.
In the 17th century, alchemists devised symbols to identify various materials. These symbols had to be secret because alchemists were persecuted. So, there are multiple symbols for each “element.” Most of the symbols in use today are those devised by prominent alchemists of the time.
Here is a link to a site presenting the various symbols of alchemy.
Alchemy Symbols and Their Meanings
Here are some of th symbols for metals.
Notice the symbols for gold and silver, for example. You might on rare occasion see those on treasure maps.
The gold symbol is sometimes just a circle with a center dot.
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I received the following from Mark G., who talks of a metal detecting scourge that is now competing with those pesky pull tabs.
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| A Varied Collecton Of Dug Targets From a Recent Hunt By Mark G. |
I took a week off to burn time and get some metal detecting in but the weather has been against me and I failed to be out early in the cuts. None-the-less I have been working my favorite intracoastal beaches hit hard by wind waves and what’s left of the coastal beaches. The only place I have been able to find targets is above the cut where sand got washed away but the tides never brought new sand up and over the cut. No gold but I have been able to fill all the jars every hunt. Reason I’m writing is to bring attention to a new phenomenon brought on by the tornadoes (like we have never seen before) in my true story below that will affect us all.
There is a new nemesis on the beach that will soon rival the failed human experiment I call “the pull tab”. We didn’t stop the pull tabs from polluting the beach we just changed the shape of them. The pull tab stays attached to the can people!
That’s not what I’m writing about, in the early days after Milton the beaches were littered with Styrofoam pieces large and small and all the commentators had no clue where it came from. I just recently built a new house and I can tell you there is a large amount of Styrofoam that goes into construction of new homes and buildings. There is blown in Styrofoam on the inside of the roof, there is double foil back 1” Styrofoam insulation that insulates all the exterior walls. What do you think happens when a tornado pulls the roof off a building and sucks up all the light weight material (Styrofoam) and carries it thousands of feet into the air for miles? By the track of Milton I would say it drops it in the ocean off the east coast.
The nemesis is that Styrofoam with aluminum foil on it. I came across several pieces today and they all sounded like small gold, the same single as those one gallon jug foil seals. They are getting buried even though they float and you can’t not dig them. They are going to be around for years unfortunately until we clean them all out like the pull tabs, but the pull tabs just keep coming separated from the can free to… sorry I digress.
Thank You
Mark G.
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| Source: SurfGuru.com. |
The high tides are down just a touchh.
The surf chart shown above suggests the possibility of a higher surf coming later next week.
Good hunting,
TreasureGuide@comcast.net
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