Buttons

bbuttons3Brass ring (right) recovered from the earthen berm enclosed area.  This ring is the interior metal portion of a Singleton button (left), a type of cloth button that was formed over an interior brass ring.  An x-ray of these buttons (center) reveals the interior ring, including the solder point where the ends of the brass wire ring are joined.  Singletons generally date from the 1750s into the 1860s (Chappell 1969).  The illustrated Singletons are from the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation collection, as shown in Hinks (1995: 47).  Singletons typically were utilitarian buttons worn on clothing such as shirts.

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