Green Tansitional Slag

[winnie]

I see nothing else than a Japanese slag.

[orbboy]

It is a harder to find colour though. Olive Green is what I have sold them in the past as. I think I only have two right now, and maybe a couple in the junker tub.

[ann]

With the new pics, yep, Japanese.

I also see enough green in them now to make the chartreuse call, A color not often seen in slags from anywhere. I have a chartreuse Barberton one I got from Alan B. a few years ago, but I don't remember seeing any others in a while. Haven't ever seen a Japanese one.

If it were darker I'd call it olive too.

Interesting find --

[Rooneydog]

Ok so for this beginner this is a handmade Japanese slag (not a transitional) drawn of a cane ? of a very unusual colour ?

[ann]

Japanese handmade = hand-gathered (as opposed to cane-cut) slag. Lately I've been trying to avoid using the word "transitional" but most collectors would know what you meant if you said "Japanese transitional." Unusual color or hard-to-find color, either one.

[Rooneydog]

Thanks Ann - sorry to be obtuse but is this a cane cut slag ? hence 2 pontils

[ann]

Not being obtuse! Ask away!

There have been cane-cut slags, but they are exceedingly rare, and some would argue that they're not really slags. I might argue that too, since the base glass is very nearly opaque, but I haven't seen enough in person to do more than flail around on the subject.

Generally speaking, slags are not cane cut. They're hand-gathered, one at a time. Honestly, I'm kind of struggling with the two pontil thing here, because in the first set of pics I can clearly see what you'd expect to see on any hand-gathered slag = the characteristic "9" (or "6" if you look at it the other way around), which reveals the circular (or spiral) swirling motion the gatherer made when he dipped the metal rod (punty) into the pot of hot glass. The real (single) pontil should be at the opposite pole, where the gob of glass (soon-to-be-marble) is cut off of the rod.

Which pontil is opposite the "9" and where is the other one, in relationship to those two points? Is the rough one in the "o" of the nine? And the spidery one opposite it?

I'm wondering if the rough (non-spidery-looking) is really maybe a manufacturing defect, like the hot (but cooling) marble accidentally ran into something, roughing / crinkling up the surface, or something . . .

[Rooneydog]

The rough pontil is directly opposite the spider pontil

The rough pontil only appears to have a small bit of white on it and this is very rough and on the outside, as can be seen in the first pics.

The marble is basically clear at the rough end, the white swirl gets nowhere near it.

Hope this makes sense

[ann]

Makes sense.

I'm inclined to think of the rough pontil as an as-made thingy at the moment.

Other opinions? Ideas?

[I'llhavethat1]

Haven't seen the "spaghetti" surface from the original post (pic 3) in a non-machine rounded marble before, so yes the second rough spot is probably just a fluke.

Good for bringing it up though, nice topic for discussion. Unusual size/color as well

[lstmmrbls]

Defect IMO