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Bill Hunt's Medicine
Bottle Glass Index
This database is a reference to aid in the identification
of embossed medicine bottles. It is equally appropriate
for researching complete labels as well as label fragments
and is suitable for use by bottle collectors as well
as historical archeologists. The finding aid is available
as a Microsoft Word document or as a text file. The
data file was built as a text file to allow the researcher
to employ word processing software text finding aides
(a "word search") to locate strings of letters, complete
words, or combinations of words which appear on a bottle
or bottle fragment. It includes about 6,080 entries.
The embossed label listing was compiled using information
from 38
archeological reports and popular bottle publications.
Printed labels were not used in the data file's compilation.
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About
this bottle |
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Entry format
Each entry includes:
- a label as it appears on the bottle description.
The compiler's comments are contained in square brackets
[like this].
- a tab character.
- a bibliographic reference from which the label was
obtained.
Embossed labels are listed following standard notation.
A single backslash - / - within an entry marks
the end of one line of embossed labeling and the beginning
of another on a single side of a bottle. A double backslash
- // - marks the end of embossing on one bottle
side and the beginning of another.
Citing the index
For citation purposes, refer to Hunt, William J. Jr.
(compiler), 1995, Embossed Medicine Bottle Labels:
An Electronic Finding Aid for the Identification of
Archeological Specimens. National Park Service,
Midwest Archeological Center, Lincoln, Nebraska. Revised
August, 1997.
Using the index
The bottle glass index is currently
available as a PDF file (551k)
or as a html file (824k).
The index is very large (over 360 pages), so
it may take
a while
to download (2-3 minutes on a 56k connection). The best
strategy is to search for the string of letters and
spaces
as they appear on the bottle or bottle fragment. Once
a label has been identified, the user may consult
the
appropriate reference(s) for additional information about
the bottle, manufacturer, date of manufacture, and
contents.
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