1869 Drinking Cups and their Customs (Mixellany)

COTS AND THEIR CUSTOMS. 8 Shala, So ale-goblets in Celtic were termed Kalt-skaal; and, though applied in other ways, the word lingers in the Highland Scotch as SMel (a tub), and in the Ork- neys the same word does duty for a flagon. From this root, though more immediately derived from ScutelM, a concave vessel, through the Italian Scodella and the French Ecuelie (a porringer), we have the homestead word Skillet still used in England. There is no lack, in .old chronicles, of examples illustrative of that most barbarous practice of converting the skull of an enemy into a drinking-cup. Warnefrid, in his work f De Gestis Longobard./ says, €£ Albin slew Cuininurtt, and having carried away his head, converted it into a drink- ing-vessel, which kind of cup with us is called Schala/' The same thing is said of the Boii by Livy, of the Scy- thians by Herodotus, of the Scordisci by liufus Festus, of the Gauls by Diodorus Sicnlus, and of the Celts by Silius Italicus. Hence it is that llagnar Lodbrog, in his death-song, consoles himself with the reflection, €C I shall soon drink beer from hollow cups made of skulls/' In more modern timesj the middle ages for example, we find historic illustration of a new use of the word, where Skoll was applied in another though allied sense. Thus it is said of one of the leaders in the Gowryan conspiracy i€ that he did drink his skoll to my Lord Duke," meaning that the health of that nobleman was pledged; and again, at a festive table, we read that the seoll passed about j and, as a still better illustration, Calderwood says that drinking the king's skoh meant the drinking of his cup in honour of him, which, he 32