Wow, here’s a bottle that has always intrigued me. Just the name alone is strange, CONNELL’S BRAHMINICAL MOONPLANT EAST INDIAN REMEDIES, and a pair of feet with stars surrounding them about takes the cake as far as quirky embossing goes in my book. And how about the lettering font on this bottle.The R in “BRAHMINICAL” is your basic straight leg R, however, the R in “REMEDIES” and “TRADEMARK” are the curved leg R associated with western glass houses. I believe the mold for this bottle was reworked and the “EAST INDIAN REMEDIES” and “TRADEMARK” added at a later date, however, I do not have any concrete proof that this was the case.
Was this a bitters, well it certainly was supposed to cure the same ailments as a bitters, I don’t think so but it certainly is an interesting bottle. The definition of BRAHMINICAL is; A member of a cultural and social elite, especially of that formed by descendants of old New England families. Trying to find the definition of MOONPLANT led me to moonflower which is defined as: Any of several unrelated vines which bloom at night. Even the
name of this product has me baffled; was it an extract of some sort of climbing vine that was intended to be used by wealthy Boston socialites in the moonlight? Got me.......
I have heard that there are two variants of this bottle, one an eastern made product and the other western manufactured. What’s the difference? Got me......
The earliest and one of the only advertisements that I could find for the Moonplant was listed in the May 1873 Sacramento Daily Union and was repeated for a week or so, that’s it.
Thanks to Jeff Wichmann for the pictures
Awesome Bottle, these bottles are so Kool, I hope to own one someday. Great little article, its Kool when you can read these old ads on some of these bottles. I have always liked the Quack Medicines and bottles of that type. Kool! DB
ReplyDeleteI have one of these...it's in decent shape, too!
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