Mazer (drinking vessel)

(The Oxford English Dictionary records speculation, for example, that the word occurs in the place-name Maserfield whose etymology is, however, uncertain.)

[5][6] The examples that have been preserved above ground are generally of the most expensive kind, with large mounts in silver, but some archaeological sites have produced quantities of plain wood mazers, which were no doubt the most common at the time.

On the outside, but generally not the inside of the metal band there is often an inscription, religious, or convivial, and the print was also often decorated with a sculpted or engraved plate, and sometimes a gem.

[8] The Bute Mazer is one of the most elaborate to survive, with a three-dimensional reclining lion rising from the base, and enamelled coats of arms in a circle around it.

[10] Later examples may be raised on a stem, perhaps copying the style of covered cups;[11] some from about 1550 onwards are effectively tazzas that are partly in wood.

[12] Large ornamented mazers were probably passed around the table for toasts and the like, as some covered cups were, but more ordinary ones may have been regarded as personal within a group such as a household, ship or monastery, with the finer examples likely being reserved for the leading figures.

In 1395 John de Scardeburgh, rector of Tichmarsh, left twelve mazers, two more than were recorded in an inventory of the treasure of Henry IV of England four years later.

Many of the English survivals were preserved in Oxbridge colleges, livery companies, hospitals and other institutions going back to the Middle Ages.

If the mazer is filled too full, liquid runs down the column and out of the foot,[22] no doubt a trick played on unwary first-timers dining at the college.

[23] A very fine example in the British Museum, from France or Flanders, probably in the early 15th century, has a very thin wooden bowl, and silver mountings of excellent quality, including enamels, but neither the cup nor the cover have metal on the rim, or ever seem to have done so.

Possibly the work of Adam Leys, today it is part of the Silver Treasury, level 5 of the Scotland Galleries in Edinburgh.