pouncet-box

English

Alternative forms

• pouncet box

Etymology

Compare French poncette.

Noun

pouncet-box (plural pouncet-boxes)

1. (historical) A box with a perforated lid, used to contain pounce or perfume.

   Carrying a pouncet-box was a common custom among the upper classes in the 16th and 17th centuries.

   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene iii], lines 37-38:

     And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held / A pouncet-box.

   • 1866, Septimus Piesse, Pouncet Box and Pomander, entry in Notes and Queries: 3rd Series, Volume 9: January—June 1866, page 392,

     The pouncet box mentioned by Shakespeare in the Midsummer Night's Dream, I have always considered as a similar article to the pomander worn by "fashionable people" in the time of Elizabeth, containing powdered perfumery, such as musk, civet, and various spices.

   • 1894 (1819), Walter Scott, Ivanhoe, Ginn & Company, page 364,

     " […] besides what is broken and spoiled among their rude hands, such as my pouncet-box and silver crisping-tongs."

   • 1957, George Bernard Hughes, Small Antique Silverware, Bramhall House, page 186,

     More usually, however, the pouncet box hung from the waist by a black cord, until early in the seventeenth century. To Elizabethans the ceremonial of inhaling the piquant odour from the pouncet box was a social grace.

Usage notes

The hyphenated spelling dates back at least to Shakespeare and is repeated in numerous old dictionaries that cite him for usage.

See also

• pomander

References

• “pouncet box”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

Further reading

• Pomander § Pouncet box on Wikipedia.Wikipedia