Common WJieel.

77

Chap. 10.]

time he wrote. Sometimes the shaft was placed in the edge of the well,so that the person that moved it walked round the latter, and thus occu-pied less space.

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No. 26. Common Wheel or Capstan.

Circumstances, highly illustrative of European manners during theearly part of the 17th and preceding centuries, are assoc-iated with the in-troduction of table-forks. They were partially known in Italy in the llthCentury, for in a letter of Peter Damiani , who died in 1073, mention ismade of a lady from Constantinople , who was married to the Doge ofVenice, and who among other stränge customs, required rain-water towash herseif, and was so fastidious respecting her food, as to use a fork,and a golden one too, to take her meat, which was previously cut intosmall pieces by her servant. Lon. Quart. Review, vol. 58. (April, 1837.)They are mentioned, (probably as curiosities) in a charter of FerdinandI. of Spain , 1101, and in the wardrobe accounts of Edward I. of England,‘a pair of knives with sheathes of silver enameled, and aforke of chrystal,’are specified. Fosbroke, Ency. Ant. Forks were common in Italy inthe 15th Century, although nearly unknown in France and England in thefollowing one. At the close of the 16th, they are noticed as a luxury inFrance , and Jately introduced. Henry the Fourth’s fork is still preserved—it has two prongs, and is of Steel. So late as 1641, they were not uni-versal m Paris . In a representation of a great feast held by the cobblersin that year, and attended by musicians, &c.—no forks are on thetable—the carver holds what appears to be a leg of mutton with one hand,while with the other he cuts a slice off, for a lady seated next to him.Hone’s Every Day Book, vol. ii, 1055.

They were not used in England tili about the same time, a period muchlater than might have been supposed. In 1611, an Englishman was ridi-culed for using one. This was Coryat.t the eccentric traveler. “ I ob-served,” he says, “ a custom in all those Italian cities and townes throughthe which I passed, that is not used in any other country that I saw in mytravels; neither do I think that any other nation of Christendome doth useit, but only Italy . The Italian and most strangers that are commorant,| dwelling] in Italy do alwaies at their meales use a little forhe, when theycut their meate. For while with their knife, which they hold in onehand, they cut the meate out of the dish, they fasten their forke which