clack-dish

Definitions

noun A beggar's dish or receptacle for money, fitted with a lid so arranged as to produce when agitated a clatter upon the edge of the vessel. Its use was abandoned in the seventeenth century, and it was succeeded by the alms-pot. Also called clap-dish.

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Who, not the duke? yes, your beggar of fifty; and his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish: the duke had crotchets in him.

Measure for Measure 2004
Who? not the duke? yes, your beggar of fifty, and his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish; the duke had crotchets in him.

Act III. Scene II. Measure for Measure 1914
III. ii.135 (85,9) [clack-dish] The beggars, two or three centuries ago, used to proclaim their wont by a wooden dish with a moveable cover, which they clacked to shew that their vessel was empty.

Notes to Shakespeare — Volume 01: Comedies Samuel Johnson 1746
Who, not the duke? yes, your beggar of fifty; and his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish: the duke had crotchets in him.

Measure for Measure 1604
_ Who, not the Duke? yes, your beggar of fifty; and his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish: the Duke had crotchets in him.

Measure for Measure The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.] William Shakespeare 1590