Tudor money box

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

16th century Tudor money box
Money pot

A Tudor money box (or Tudor money pot) is a glazed earthenware container used in late Medieval Britain as a small, portable bank for collecting and saving money. The typical money box was a round, sealed, green-glazed pot with a vertical coin slot. These sturdy, small pots were commonly used by Elizabethan theatres to collect ticket earnings. Money would be retrieved from the full money box by breaking it open and destroying the pot.

The small ceramic money box was typically spherical in shape. By the 16th century, the form included a tapering, bell-shaped, knobbed top. The container was completely sealed with a narrow coin slot on the side.[1] The glazed, ceramic pots were produced in Surrey and near the Surrey-Hampshire borders.[2] Individual pots were made by white-firing earthenware and then decorating each item with a coloured glaze, known as "Tudor Green". The distinctive colour was created by adding powdered copper to a clear, lead glaze. The glazed pot would range in colour from dark green to yellow-green, depending upon the colour of the clay and thickness of the glaze.[3]

History

See also

References

Related Articles

Wikiwand AI