Artefacts

at The Butter Museum

The Artefacts section at The Butter Museum in Cork offers a captivating glimpse into the history of butter production and packaging. Featuring a variety of historical items, this collection highlights the tools, packaging, and memorabilia that have shaped butter’s rich cultural heritage. It’s a fascinating journey through time, revealing the evolution of butter-making traditions.

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Butter stamps

Butter stamps are carved wooden objects that were used to make an impression on butter. It was to denote a brand of butter, sometimes farm or home-made, before the concept of labelling with wrappers came about. It was found especially useful to members of the community who were illiterate.

Cracked Butter stamp
This butter stamp is cracked, possibly from the wood having been unseasoned.
Fern Butter Stamp
This stamp depicts a fern. Many butter stamps utilised flora.
Three leaved flora stamp
The boundary of this stamp, in common with many other stamps, is etched with a simple decorative motif.
Thistle Butter Stamp (1)
A flowering milk thistle is depicted in this stamp.
Thistle Butter Stamp (2)
This stamp is in poor condition compared to Thistle Butter Stamp (1). Different conditions such as humidity, type of wood used, and simple wear and tear, can contribute to this deterioration.
Star Butter Stamp
This is a delightfully geometric stamp, the design from which we created a ceramic magnet print that is currently for sale in our shop.

Wooden Utensils

Firkins, Noggins and Piggins are wooden utensils used to carry milk or butter. Piggins and Noggins are similar in that they are both staved vessels that would have been used as milking pails. Firkins are members of the cask family and were used to carry butter. They became the main unit of volume used for the Cork Butter Exchange.

Noggin
The noggin is the smaller of the two and could have been also used as a cup for drinking milk. A well-made piggin and noggin did not require nails or glue to hold it together – the staved constructions, the hoops (either wooden or metal), and the shrinking involved with the liquid, held it together.
Piggin
A wooden pail, usually used in the process of milking and carrying that milk to the farm dairy. Notice the stave that has been extended to serve as a handle.
Firkin
A small cask for the transport of butter. Its capacity varied from 56-70 lbs of butter.
Butter Working Bowl
Butter made for home use was ‘worked’ using butter spades in butter working bowls. This particular example is interesting in that the bowl has been repaired using metal staples – reminding us of an age when the concept of recycling had not been named yet but was well understood.

Crocks

Crocks are glazed earthenware that would have been used in the dairy or cool room of the farmhouse.

Crock One
This crock is notable in that it had for a time been used to store eggs, the act of which has discoloured the glaze.
Crock Two
We managed to digitally capture this crock before it was broken in real life – this opens up an interesting conversation as to both the significance and the advantages (or otherwise) surrounding digital representation.
Crock Three
An interesting pot on which the glazing is only used for decoration.