Identifying Antique Furniture

• You can often date a piece by studying nails and screws.



Nails



1.  Furniture predating 1790 will include "rose-head nails," that were hand-forged by blacksmiths. These nails can be identified by their irregular, rose-shaped heads.
2. "Square-head nails," employed from 1790 to 1830, were machine cut and finished off by a blacksmith who squared the heads. 
3. From 1830 to 1890 cabinetmakers used headless "machine-cut nails, that are tapered and rectilinear in shape. 
4. Modern "brad" and "penny" nails were introduced around 1890. 
5. Screws were occasionally used in furniture pre-dating the beginning of the machine era (Circa 1830).  Blacksmith forged examples can be identified by inspecting for thin and slightly off-centered slots and off-round heads.
    

• The "circular saw" invented in the 18th century, did not come into wide usage until after 1830.  Thus, boards displaying "circular saw marks" will not be found on furniture pre-dating the "Empire Period" (1830-1850). Unfinished pre-1830 boards cut from vertical motion "ripsaws" will often display small, somewhat parallel, saw lines.
   
• Before the introduction of power driven woodworking machinery in the mid 19th century, lumber was worked by hand. After hand-sawing, cabinet makers dressed their boards with a jack plane and draw knives. On authentic furnishings pre-dating the "Victorian Period," (1850-1910) unfinished non-visible "secondary" surfaces like backboards and drawer bottoms will show evidence of "hand-planing" by feeling for subtle undulating rows in the wood.
   
• Small wooden pins known as dowels can be helpful in authenticating age.  Machine era pins will be perfectly circular and flush to the surface.  Antique dowels are non-round and will protrude slightly from the surface because of shrinkage in the wood they are securing. 

Dowels

 

• Wood shrinks in a direction opposite the grain.  The degree is determined by softness of the lumber, age, and environment.  Therefore, authentic antique furniture can be discerned by inspecting for evidence of: gapping between boards, shrinkage cracking, buckling veneer, protruding pegs and breadboard ends, and legs extending slightly beyond the frame or "skirt." Early circular tabletops will measure somewhat oval, 1/8" to 1/2" longer in the direction of the grain.
   
• Outline and thickness on early hand-wrought iron and brass hinges will be non-uniform.
   
• The top rail on early 19th century chairs will be joined with non-round tenons that can be viewed by slightly pulling the yoke from the stile. Circular dowels are evidence of  "non-period" chairs.
   
• Visible surface planks (primary wood) on genuine antique furniture will be wide, varying in thickness, and relatively free of blemishes.  Knotty pine was not employed by olden day cabinetmakers.
   
• Although it has been stripped and refinished back to the original wood, much old-time non-mahogany furniture was originally painted.  Analysis of wood pores and fissures with a jeweler's loop will often show several layers of paint residue. This "paint history" can help authentic a piece and determine whether individual components-the feet, the top, etc.-are original or undesirable replacements.

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