Hand Blown Glass Plates

I have 3 clear glass bread and butter/luncheon plates - very plain - except that they are hand blown. I'm guessing that there was a period in the transition from pewter to ceramic that hand blown glass might have been used. Are these plates from that period and when was it?
The 1st 3 pictures are of a pair of plates 7" in diameter with fully ground / polished flat bottoms. Pictures 4 & 5 are of a single plate 6.25" in diameter with a convex ground pontil.
Are these of any value? Does anybody collect this sort of thing or are they just curiosities?

 

Ceramics became affordable before glass, there wasn't really a period where glass plates were commonly used for dinnerware in the 19th century. Glass plates from the Victorian period were used for desserts and referred to as 'ice plates' and they were popular for frozen or chilled desserts. You would often find the plate was used as a tray and there would be a bowl on top.

It is of course very hard to say from a pic how old they are as someone could create them today by blowing them just like this. Antique ones should have wear to the undersides, the glass is generally less clear than modern pieces and you should see striation lines in the material, possibly also tooling marks from the glass blowers pincers around the edges.

 

From what you say, I would guess that these are 'ice plates' They have quite a lot of small abrasion as well as small bubbles. Would 'ice plates' have been hand blown?

 

Yes, blown ones were the most common in the mid 19th century.

 

Not to demean your plates, but they might have been pressed. Glass doesn't seem to want to be pressed flat, so plates are pressed in a bowl shape then stuck up on a punty rod and tooled flat. It's still hand work. You might try to find somewhere on the underside an etched fleur-di-lis and the word "Steuben."

 

Thanks for the info.

Nothing on the bottom. I'm pretty sure these are handblown.