XI.—On the English medieval drinking bowls called Mazers

Abstract

Of all the drinking vessels in use from the thirteenth to the sixteenth centuries, none were so common and so much prized as those known to us as mazers. They occur in numerous wills and inventories under various names, such as ciphi or cuppae de mazero or de murra, mazeri, ciphi murrei, mazerei, hanaps de maser, and later as murrae and mazers, etc., on the derivations of which much valuable matter has been written. But, under whatever name it appears, it is quite clear that the same vessel is meant, viz. a drinking bowl turned out of some kind of wood, but by preference of maple, and especially the spotted or speckled variety which we call bird's-eye maple.