CREDENCE or CREDENCE TABLE, originally a small side-table placed near the high table, in royal or noble houses, for the tasting of food and drink for poisons by an official of the household called the praegustator or credentiarius. The name (from Med. Lat. credentia, Ital. credenza, Fr. credence), survived after the disuse of this precautionary ceremony, and the table de veloped into the buffet (q.v.). In the Roman Catholic Church the credence table is a small table of wood or stone, placed near the wall on the south side of the altar, to hold the cruets contain ing the wine and water, the chalice, acolytes' candlesticks and other objects to be used in the Mass. The use of such a table ap pears to have arisen after the disuse of personal presentation of oblations at the Mass. In some English churches the old stone credence tables still exist (e.g., at St. Cross near Winchester), most frequently as a stone shelf near the piscina; some carved wooden ones also survive. The use of the credence table has been revived in the English Church, and has been pronounced legal.