cresset

plural cressets

1. A metal cage, basket or cup with fire in it, used for various purposes:
   1. historicalA metal cup, suspended from or attached to the top of a pole and filled with burning pitch etc., used as portable illumination.

      Of Starry Lamps and blazing Creſſets fed ¶ With Naphtha and Aſphaltus yeilded light

      1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC, signature [C4], verso, lines 728–729

      1 more example

      And as a Cresset true that darts its length ¶ Of beamy lustre from a tower of strength;

      a. 1851, William Wordsworth, “Stanzas suggested in a Steam-boat off St. Bees’ Heads, on the coast of Cumberland”, in Henry [Hope] Reed, editor, The Complete Poetical Works of William Wordsworth, Philadelphia, Pa.: Hayes & Zell, […], published 1860, →OCLC, stanza 5, page 316, column 2

   2. A small furnace or iron cage to hold fire for charring the inside of a cask, and making the staves flexible.

      1805–1814, Dante Alighieri, Henry Francis Cary (translator), The Divine Comedy, "Inferno", Canto VIII We reach'd the lofty turret's base, our eyes / its height ascended, where we mark'd uphung / two cressets and another saw from far

1. A surname.