Letter B inside the top of an ornate ceramic decanter

by Martin Bradley
(East Sussex. United Kingdom.)

Hello,

I am new to collecting pottery so have purchased lots of different items over the last couple of years and now I want to find out about the pieces that I have. I've had great fun researching the beautiful pieces that I have. I don't have much money so have not spent more than about £25 on any one piece.

I live in a small coastal town on the south east coast of England and the town is known as 'God's waiting room'. [I'm sure you've heard this before! The nice thing about this town is that there are lots of antique shops and charity shops. Everyone leaving for Heaven as it were and their goods are put into antique sale rooms and the like. It's like a treasure trove down here. Great fun too!

I want to be able to describe each piece I have if I want to sell it. It's horrible feeling, being ignorant!
I think your site is fantastic; well done for doing this for me/us to enjoy.

Looking at this beautiful little piece of pottery/porcelain, I wonder what it might have looked like when it first came onto the market? I wonder what kind of person would have purchased it? I wonder if it was originally part of a set with small cups to go with it? I wonder if it was used by a little old lady who had a house filled with beautiful objects.
When you look back through history, people were smaller.

Maybe this was an adequate size for someone in the nineteenth century. For me today: I think it is rather small and if it was used as some kind of decanter, you'd hardly even get one glass out of it nowadays! Ha, Ha! Made myself laugh there!

Maybe it was some kind of port decanter or sherry decanter. Again, thinking back historically, the glasses to drink from used to be very small. I remember my own parents talking of having a 'nip' as they called it In Scotland as that is where I grew up.

Some of the houses in the town I grew up in had really small front doors hence my comments previously about everything being smaller. People were a lot smaller. I went to look at a house to buy and just couldn't because I banged my head on the door frame going in and I'm under 6 foot tall myself! Yikes! Laughing again! Help! I need to get out more.

I have a lot of pieces and will enjoy looking at previous questions and enquiries, and their relevant responses. I hope you don’t think I am babbling but I am struggling to get 600 words in this part of the enquiry.
This little decanter cost me £3 hey big spender!. I have some slipware with a silver rim but will research that later.
I have some witchy porcelain that I want to research as well.

Can I just enter a few words that will bring me up to 600 words without getting into trouble? I’ll do that now.

Thanks for your help anyone that can.

Goodbye for now.

Regards

Martin