pyx
noun
- small round container used in the Catholic, Old Catholic and Anglican Churches to carry the consecrated host
Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /pɪks/
noun
Etymology: The noun is derived from Late Middle English pix, pixe (“vessel for holding a host, pyx; hip bone socket, pyxis”) [and other forms], from Late Latin pyxis (“vessel for holding a host”), Latin pyxis (“small box for medicines or toiletries; box holding sample coins for testing; hip bone socket; sailor's compass”), from Koine Greek πυξίς (puxís), Ancient Greek πῠξῐ́ς (pŭxĭ́s, “box; box or tablet made of boxwood; cylinder”), from πῠ́ξος (pŭ́xos, “box tree; boxwood”) + -ῐς (-ĭs, suffix forming feminine nouns). Doublet of box, piseog, and pyxis. The verb is derived from the noun.
- A small, usually round container used to hold the host (“consecrated bread or wafer of the Eucharist”), especially when bringing communion to the sick or others unable to attend Mass.
“[F]oraſmuche as we have often and many tymes, to our inwarde regrete and diſpleaſure, ſeen at oure Jen, in diverſe and many Churches of our Realme, the holie Sacrament of the Aulter kept in ful simple and inhoneſt Pixes, ſpecially Pixes of copre and tymbre: we have appointed and commaunded the Treſourer of our Chambre, and Maiſtre of our Juellhouſe, to cauſe to be made furthwith Pixes of ſilver and gilte, in a greate nombre, for the keping of the holie Sacrament of th'Aultre, after the faction of a Pixe that we have cauſed to be delivered to theim, […]”
“With Croſſes, Relicks, Crucifixes, / Beads, Pictures, Roſaries and Pixes: / The Tools of working out Salvation, / By meer Mechanick Operation.”
- A (small) box; a casket, a coffret.
“It is not Beauty, which its Bluſh doth owe / Unto the Pixe and Pencill.”
“[M]eantime some pyx to screen / The full-grown pest, some lid to shut upon / The goblin!”
- A box used in a mint as a place to deposit sample coins intended to have the fineness of their metal and their weight tested before the coins are issued to the public.
“[T]he said Tresurer and other Officers of the sayd Mynts, to bring with them, at that tyme and place, all ther Pixes, and ther severall Indentures of Coynag, by and for the holle tyme the said Assaye shall be taken.”
“When His Majesty is pleased to call for the money in the pyx to be tried, by order of his Council, the same is signified to the Lord Chancellor and Lords of the Treasury. The Lord Chancellor summons a jury of goldsmiths for the trial. The Treasury order the Mint officers to produce their pyx, and the King's Remembrancer to swear the jury.”
- A compass used by sailors.
“Here I lament I had not the accomodation^([sic]) of the Pyxis, or any Horizontal Plate divided into more points of the Compaſs, though I ſee not that Natural Knowledge requires ſo exact a Pyx as Navigation uſeth; becauſe I boggle at this, that I find the North Cardinal point gives more inſtances than the Weſt.”
“Who travels in religious jars, / (Truth mixt with error, ſhade with rays,) / Like Whiſton wanting pyx or ſtars, / In ocean wide or ſinks or ſtrays.”
verb
Etymology: The noun is derived from Late Middle English pix, pixe (“vessel for holding a host, pyx; hip bone socket, pyxis”) [and other forms], from Late Latin pyxis (“vessel for holding a host”), Latin pyxis (“small box for medicines or toiletries; box holding sample coins for testing; hip bone socket; sailor's compass”), from Koine Greek πυξίς (puxís), Ancient Greek πῠξῐ́ς (pŭxĭ́s, “box; box or tablet made of boxwood; cylinder”), from πῠ́ξος (pŭ́xos, “box tree; boxwood”) + -ῐς (-ĭs, suffix forming feminine nouns). Doublet of box, piseog, and pyxis. The verb is derived from the noun.
- To place (the host) in a pyx.
“Than was yt boxed pyxed and tabernacled & so borne forth in processyon with torche lyght banner crosse candelstyck.”
“The bread that was left of this consecration or breaking, which was so holy as the other, was neither housed nor churched, boxed nor pixed, but remained there still to the householders, to be eaten of whomsoever lusted.”
- To enclose (something) in a box or other container; specifically, to place (a deceased person's body) in a coffin; to coffin, to encoffin.
“Here lies poor Artedi, in foreign land pyx'd / Not a man nor a fish, but something betwixt, / Not a man, for his life amongst fishes he past, / Not a fish, for he perished by water at last.”
“There pyxed in alabastrine cell, / All uncorrupt his shade shall dwell, / While waves his memory chime; […]”
- To deposit (sample coins) in a pyx; (by extension) to test (such coins) for the fineness of metal and weight before a mint issues them to the public.
“After the said moneys shall be by the said warden and the assaymaster tried and pyxed as ordered by the said indenture, the said master worker shall make true deliverance and payment of the same to every person by weight by the same balance and weight whereof he shall receive the same bullion, taking again his said bills; […]”
“[W]hen the money is coined it is not allowed to go out of the mint until pixed; that is, until it had been ascertained, by the assay of one piece taken out of each journeyweight of coin, that it is of standard purity: […]”