PITCHER M, cad, from 113, to labour se verely, to toil hard: pr., in the manner of smiths and other artisans ; spec., to draw out of a well, to draw water' (Ges.) ; hence, a vessel for drawing from a well; LXX. 6Ipla; Vulg. hydria, lagena, (Ges. and Fiirst. in verbo) ), a vessel with one or two handles, used principally, but not exclusively, by women, for drawing and carrying water from neighbouring wells* (Gen. xxiv. 14, 17, 79). It was ordinarily, if not always, of earthenware, as is curiously illustrated by Gideon's successful stra tagem of lamps' and empty pitchers' ( Judg. vii. 16, 19). In r Kings xvii. 12, and xviii. 33, the Hebrew word is rendered in the A. V. barrel ;' in the former case the vessel is made to serve for holding meal ;' the poor widow's poverty fur nishing nothing better for the purpose, and her store of provisions reduced so low as to require nothing larger. In Eccles. xii. 6 the Hebrew word
is employed figuratively,—` or the pitcher be broken at the fountain,'—where the pitcher is the image of the individual life ; the well of the general life' (Hengs.), whence the individual life is drawn. In the N. T. the pitcher,' is also simply an earthen vessel (Mark xiv. 13 ; Luke xxii. to), where a man' bears it full of water. Words worth makes it here the symbol of baptism pre ceding and leading to the holy supper ! In many parts of India women of the first quality draw water daily from the public wells ; and bear ing the pitcher on the shoulder instead of the head seems to be a distinction ; for an intelligent native inferred, from Rebecca's so carrying it, that she was a woman of high caste (see Kitto's .Pict. Bib., Gen. xxiv.)—I. J.