[Sca-cooks] Tableware

[Terry Decker]

I would suggest you take a look at Menagier.  He directs that trencher
loaves be specially purchased for wedding meals.  The meals were for 30
bowls plus six servants.  Menagier ordered the purchas of three dozen
trencher loaves, or one for each person present.  This suggests that
trenchers were not in common use outside of the great households.

If you use the Assisa Panis to calculate the cost of preparing trenchers, it
is easy to see why they would be seldom used outside of the great
households.  One person using two trencher loaves per day (one for each of
two meals) would cost just under 2 1/2 shillings and 1/2 ton of flour per
year.  Most of the etiquette manuals suggest that a person might use several
loaves per meal.  Only the great households could afford this expense.

As far as I have been able to determine, trencher use began in the 11th
Century, probably in France.  It was definitely established there by the
early 12th Century.  Trenchers were definitely used in England and France,
Central Europe and east into Poland.  I've found no evidence of their use
east of Poland, in the Mediterranean countries and in Scandinavia.  The area
of use conforms to the areas of Europe where the manorial system was
practiced most fully.

Trencher use appears to have peaked between the 13th and 14th Centuries.
After the 13th Century, household accounts show a decline in the expenditure
on bread, suggesting a decline in the use of trenchers except for special
occasions.

Anyway, out of curiosity, Brangwayna, what sources did you use in your
research on trenchers?  I want to add them to the collection I'm working on
to fill out the working paper on trenchers I presented at the Serve It Forth
Sypmosium in January.

Bear


-----Original Message-----

>mneumark at hotmail.com writes:
>
>
>> The wooden plate thing sort of bothers me personally.  Unless you were
dirt
>> poor, after the 11th century, most merchant,upper class lords and ladies
>> ether ate off metal plates or had pottery
>
>Really?  Much of my research indicates that in 12th century England and
>France, they rarely used plates, but used trenchers instead, and that that
>practice carried over for well over a century afterwards.  Certainly there
>are trenchers shown in, among other places, the feasting scenes of the Duc
de
>Berry's book of hours, which is 14th century, I believe, and depicts
banquets
>served for nobles.
>Certainly there is metalware (mostly utensils and covered hanaps or
drinking
>vessels) depicted on the tables, but I don't recall seeing plates that
>frequently for personal eating.  Certainly they appear as serving utensils.
>
>Brangwayna Morgan