Medieval Spoons

I enjoy carving spoons and I am generally game to try almost any pattern, within reason.  But I keep coming back to this one.  I mostly carve them from Alaska Birch.  I never cut down a tree to get spoon wood.  No need.  I look for trees that have been cut to clear land or scraps from wood cut for firewood.  If a tree falls across a road, I will happily collect some spoon wood.  

These were used all over Europe for at least 500 years.  There's one very similar to this pattern that was found on the Mary Rose.  They show up in all sorts of places and times. They don't work all that well for modern eating styles, which is really interesting to me.  It is evidence that people actually used their eating utensils differently 500 to 1000 years ago than they do today.  

Next to a modern teaspoon, you can see how large the bowl of one of these spoons is! In this picture, you can also see that I like to leave the surface of my spoons faceted from the knives I use to carve them.  A sharp knife leaves a smoother surface than sandpaper, even if it looks faceted from the tool marks.  

A concern I've heard expressed a couple of times is that eating with a wooden spoon will leave splinters in the mouth.  I don't understand this, as the same person doesn't worry about a wooden floor leaving splinters in the feet or a wooden chair leaving splinters in the backside.  But something about a wooden spoon just seems to worry some people.  

I have a lot of these spoons (and a few other styles) in a nice clay pot on my counter.  I am sure I don't need to have so many for the wooden spoon needs of one family, but I enjoy making them and I enjoy using them, so I keep them where they can be seen.  

I don't sell my spoons.  But I do sometimes give them away.  That is just how I prefer to do it.  

There's something truly homey about a wooden spoon.  In another post, I will eventually show some of my cooking spoons.