We got some wine the other day and for some reason I mentioned the punt on one of the bottles being exceptionally large. Claire said she didn’t know the indention on the bottom of the bottle had a name. Well, it does — it’s called a “punt.” I’ve also heard it called a kick-up, push-up and dimple.
So it does have a name and it does have a purpose — we’ll talk about the purpose another time. Today, let’s talk about why it’s called a punt. I’ll tell you right up front, that I don’t know — and — I’m not sure anyone really knows…. but let’s talk about it.
If you look up the word punt, you’ll find that it relates to a flat-bottomed boat and a tactic in American football. Now what the relationship between a flat-bottomed boat, football and the dimple in the bottom of a wine bottle is, I just haven’t figured out.
One dictionary I checked actually had 5 definitions:
1. verb — delay in answering or taking action; equivocate.
2. noun — a long, narrow, flat-bottomed boat, square at both ends and propelled with a long pole, used on inland waters chiefly for recreation.
3. noun — A football kick after the ball is dropped from the hands of the player and before it reaches the ground.
4. noun — informal, a bet
5. noun — the basic monetary unit of the Republic of Ireland (until replaced by the euro,) equal to 100 Irish pence.
None of the dictionaries that I checked mentioned the word punt as related to wine bottles. But trust me, punt is the name given to the funny concave bump, or dimple at the bottom of a wine bottle. Search as I could, I couldn’t find an explanation that satisfied me. Punt as used with the flat-bottomed boat comes from Latin ponto. (That’s also where pontoon comes from.)
The closest I could come to a reasonable explanation that might explain the “hollow” in the bottom of the wine bottle comes from the French word pontil, a word for the iron rod that’s used to hold or shape soft glass. The Oxford dictionary says it means a little point.
My research also found that glassblowers used to create these dimples, or punts to push the seam of a bottle up, allowing the bottle to stand upright and also preventing glass at the bottom of the bottle from sticking out and cutting people.
I guess this just remains one of those things to ponder… I never questioned that it was called a punt, I just didn’t — and don’t — know why.
— 30 —