1863 Cups and their customs

CUPS AND THEIR CUSTOMS.

6

Skaaly and Skyllde, the German Schale, the Danish Skaalj and, coming to our own shores, in the Cornish So ale-goblets in Celtic were termed Kalt-skaal ; and, though applied in other ways, the word lingers in the Highland Scotch as Skiel (a tub), and in the Ork- neys the same word does duty for a flagon. From this root, though more immediately derived from Scutella^ a concave vessel, through the Italian Scodella and the French Ecuelle (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 his work ^De Gestis Longobard.,^ says, ^^Albin slew Cuminum, and having carried away his head, converted it into a drinking-vessel, which kind of cup with us is called The same thing is said of the Boii by Livy, of the Scythians by Herodotus, of the Scordisci by Rufus Festus, of the Gauls by Diodorus Siculus, and of the Celts by Silius Italicus. Hence it is that Ragnar Lodbrog, in his death-song, consoles himself with the reflection, " I shall soon drink beer from hollow cups made of skulls '^ In more modern times, 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 ^Uhat 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 b2 into a drinking-cup. Warnefrid, in Schala.'^ Skala,