Drink you this and think no scorne
All though the cup be much like horn.
The horn was not long before it had rivals: the commonest of these was the Mazer-bowl, a utensil which, with its cover on, resembled two saucers placed together rim to rim, with a topknot on the upper one. It was usually made of maple wood, from which it is supposed to have derived its name—maeser being Dutch for maple. Of this shape was the early and famous wassail-bowl. When these bowls, which in process of time were made of costlier materials than maple, were large, they were lifted to the mouth with both hands; when small, in the palm of one hand. Our ancestors were much attached to their mazers, and incurred considerable expense in embellishing them, in embossing legends admonitory of peace and good fellowship on the metal rim or on the cover, or in engraving on the bottom a cross or the image of a saint. Spenser, in The Shepherds Calendar, thus describes a vessel of this kind:—
"A mazer ywrought of the maple warre,
Wherein is enchased many a fayre sight
Of bears and tygers, that maken fiers warre;
And over them spred a goodly wilde vine,
Entrailed with a wanton yvy twine.
"Tell me, such a cup hast thou ever seene?
Well moughte it beseeme any harvest queene."
The Mazer continued in use to the seventeenth century, when it was still a favourite with the humbler classes. But on the tables of the rich it gave place to new vessels. There was the Hanap, a cup raised on a stem, with or without a cover. Besides the Hanap, a sort of mug or cup, called the Godet, had also come into vogue; then there were the Juste, used in monasteries to measure a prescribed allowance of wine; the Barrel, the Tankard, the "standing-nut," or mounted shell of the cocoa-nut; and the Grype, or Griffin's Egg, probably the egg of the ostrich. These vessels, except of course the nut and the egg, were ordinarily of silver, and sometimes of ivory, but rarely of gold; and still more rarely of glass, which did not obtain for drinking cups until the close of the fifteenth century. They were for the most part embossed or enamelled with the armorial bearings of their owners, parcel-gilt—i.e. where part of the work is gilt and part left plain; set with jewels and elaborately designed with dances of men and women, with dogs, hearts, roses, and trefoils.
One of the most esteemed Saxon trades was the smith, including workers in gold, silver, iron, and copper. The English were very expert in these arts; and in the laws of Wales the smith ranked next to the chaplain in the Prince's court. The Saxons produced some very highly-finished specimens of jewellery, goldsmith's work, and even of enamelling. A very beautiful specimen of gold enamelled work is preserved in the Ashmolean collection at Oxford: it is commonly known as Alfred's Jewel, as it bears his name, and was found in 1693, in the immediate neighbourhood of his retreat. It is filagree work, inclosing a piece of rock crystal, under which appears a figure in enamel, which has not been satisfactorily explained. The ground is of a rich blue, the face and arms of the figure white, the dress principally green, the lower portion partly of a reddish-brown. The inscription is "Aelfred mee heht gevrean," (Alfred ordered me to be made,) thus affording the most authentic testimony of its origin. Curious reliquaries, finely carved and set with precious stones, were, for excellence, called "the English work" throughout Europe. The representations of the crowns of the Saxon kings, commencing with Offa, present us with specimens of the ornamentation of the period. The ring was also a most important ornament. It was used not only for display, but also as a charm, or protection against natural or supernatural evil. The gems with which the ring was set, were believed to possess, severally, special qualities, and symbolical meanings. The sapphire indicated purity—the diamond, faith—the ruby, zeal—the amethyst was good against drunkenness—the sapphire was a protection against witchcraft, and the toad-stone against sickness. The accredited properties of decade rings, pontifical rings, alchemy rings, posie rings, and gimel rings are illustrated in various anecdotes and legends. In the medal-room of the British Museum is a gold ring, bearing the name of Ethelwulf, upon blue and black enamel: it was found in a cart-rut, at Laverstock in Hampshire; its weight is 11 dwts. 14 grains.
The crosiers of the bishops of this period were curious specimens of metal-work and gem ornamentation; as were also the shrines of the saints. In 1840 a hoard of about 7,000 coins (beside many silver ornaments) was discovered at Coverdale, near Preston, in Lancashire; they are considered by the best numismatists indisputably to belong to the chief of the Danish invaders in the ninth century, and their immediate successors. In the sepulchre of Thyra, ancestress of Canute, in Jutland, have been found the figure of a bird formed of thin plates of gold, as well as a silver cup plated with gold, both being remarkable examples of the state of the decorative arts in the tenth century.
The art of glass-making was introduced to the Saxons in the seventh century, and ordinary window-glass was first used for building purposes at the great monasteries at Monkwearmouth, on the river Wear, and at Jarrow-on-the-Tyne; although we have already seen that window-glass was used in the Roman city of Uriconium. The Venerable Bede, in the seventh century, relates that his contemporary, the Abbot Benedict, sent for artists beyond seas to glaze the Monastery of Wearmouth; and such was the change made in their churches by the use of glass, instead of other and more obscure substances for windows, that the unlettered people avowed a belief, which was handed down as a tradition for many generations, "that it was never dark in old Jarrow Church." By a singular coincidence, the first manufactory of window or crown glass in Great Britain was established at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, within a few miles of these monastic establishments. In the year 1616 Admiral Sir Robert Maunsell erected glassworks at the Ouseburn, Newcastle, which were carried on without interruption till nearly the middle of the present century, when they were closed.
The art of making woollen cloth, which was known to the Britons, was, by this time, brought to perfection in England, especially in the south. This seat of manufacture must have been handy to the fuller's-earth pits of Nutfield, where fuller's-earth has been for centuries dug:—"While Bradford was still the little local centre of a wild hill tract in pastoral Yorkshire, the 'grey cloths of Kent' kept many a loom at work in the homesteads of Tenterden, and Biddenden, and Cranbrook, and all the other little mediæval towns that dot the Weald with their carved barge-boards and richly-moulded beams." (Saturday Review, No. 182.) The distaff and the spindle, which appear to have been anciently the type, and symbol, and the insignia of the softer sex in nearly every age and country, were in the Saxon times still more conspicuous as the distinguishing badge of the female sex. Among our Saxon ancestors the "spear-half" and the "spindle-half" expressed the male and female line; and the spear and the spindle are to this day found in their graves.
The Saxons had the arts of dyeing of purple and various colours; and the Saxon ladies were eminent for their embroidery. There are descriptions extant of a robe of purple embroidered with large peacocks in black circles; and a golden veil worked with the siege of Troy, the latter a king's bequest to Croyland Abbey, where it was to be hung up on his birthday. The standards were also beautifully worked: the Danish standard, called the Raefen, was woven in one night by the three sisters of Ubbo, the Danish leader. The standard of Harold, the last Saxon sovereign of England, was the figure of a warrior richly embroidered with precious stones. In the Anglo-Saxon, and even in late periods, men worked at embroidery, especially in abbeys. At this time the dressing of hides and working in leather was practised to a great extent by the shoewright; and the wood-workman, answering to our modern carpenter, was also in general estimation. Sandals were worn by the early Saxons: there exists a print of one, made of leather, partly gilt, and variously coloured, and for the left foot of the wearer; so that "rights and lefts" are only a very old fashion revived.
The art of smelting iron was known in England during the Roman occupation; and in many ancient beds of cinders, the refuse of iron-works, Roman coins have been found. Cæsar describes iron as being so rare in Britain, that pieces of it were employed as a medium of exchange; but a century later it had become common, since in Strabo's time it was an article of exportation. There is reason to believe that the Romans worked iron ore in the hills of South Wales, as they undoubtedly did in Dean Forest, where ancient heaps of slag have occasionally been struck upon. Remains of ancient iron furnaces have also been found in Lancashire, Staffordshire, and Yorkshire.[17]