A jug is a type of

container A container is any receptacle or enclosure for holding a product used in storage, packaging, and transportation, including shipping. Things kept inside of a container are protected on several sides by being inside of its structure. The term ...

commonly used to hold liquids. It has an opening, sometimes narrow, from which to pour or drink, and has a handle, and often a pouring lip. Jugs throughout history have been made of metal, and ceramic, or glass, and plastic is now common. In

British English British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Lexico, Oxford Dictionaries, "English language, English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in ...

, jugs are pouring vessels for holding drinkable liquids, whether beer, water or soft drinks. In

North American English North American English (NAmE, NAE) is the most generalized variety of the English language as spoken in the United States and Canada. Because of their related histories and cultures, plus the similarities between the pronunciations (accents), v ...

these table jugs are usually called

pitchers In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw a ...

. Ewer is an older word for jugs or pitchers, and there are several others. Several other types of containers are also called jugs, depending on locale, tradition, and personal preference. Some types of

bottle A bottle is a narrow-necked container made of an impermeable material (such as glass, plastic or aluminium) in various shapes and sizes that stores and transports liquids. Its mouth, at the bottling line, can be sealed with an internal stop ...

s can be called jugs, particularly if the container has a narrow mouth and has a handle. Closures such as stoppers or

screw cap A screw cap or closure is a common type of closure for bottles, jars, and tubes. Usage A screw closure is a mechanical device which is screwed on and off of a "finish" on a container. Either continuous threads or lugs are used. It must be engi ...

s are common for these retail packages.

Etymology

The word jug is first recorded in the late 15th century as ''jugge'' or ''jubbe''. It is of unknown origin, but perhaps comes from ''jug'' a term for a maidservant, in the same period. This in turn comes from the alteration of common personal names such as Joan or Judith.

Beer

In certain countries, especially New Zealand and Australia, a "jug" refers to a plastic container filled with two

pint The pint (, ; symbol pt, sometimes abbreviated as ''p'') is a unit of volume or capacity in both the imperial and United States customary measurement systems. In both of those systems it is traditionally one eighth of a gallon. The British impe ...

s (just over a

litre The litre (international spelling) or liter (American English spelling) (SI symbols L and l, other symbol used: ℓ) is a metric unit of volume. It is equal to 1 cubic decimetre (dm3), 1000 cubic centimetres (cm3) or 0.001 cubic metre (m3 ...

) of

beer Beer is one of the oldest and the most widely consumed type of alcoholic drink in the world, and the third most popular drink overall after water and tea. It is produced by the brewing and fermentation of starches, mainly derived from ce ...

. It is usually served along with one or more small glasses from which the beer is normally consumed, although in some student bars it is more common for the beer to be drunk directly from the jug, which is usually served without the accompanying glass. (In the U.S., this may be called a

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

—although few US pitchers are as small as a

, generally holding between 64 and 128 U.S.

fluid ounce A fluid ounce (abbreviated fl oz, fl. oz. or oz. fl., old forms ℥, fl ℥, f℥, ƒ ℥) is a unit of volume (also called ''capacity'') typically used for measuring liquids. The British Imperial, the United States customary, and the United ...

s, approximately 2-4 litres. In New Zealand and Australia a pitcher sometimes can refer to a much larger measure of beer.) In Britain in those parts of the country where there is a choice between a pint (20 fluid ounces) tankard and a straight glass of beer, a tankard may be called a tankard or a "jug". A jug of beer may also refer to a jug containing larger amounts (usually sized in pints), but if a large jug is sold it will be advertised as such in the pub and this helps to reduce confusion.

Music

In American folk music, an empty jug (often

stoneware Stoneware is a rather broad term for pottery or other ceramics fired at a relatively high temperature. A modern technical definition is a vitreous or semi-vitreous ceramic made primarily from stoneware clay or non-refractory fire clay. Whether vi ...

used for

American whiskey American whiskey is whiskey (a distilled beverage produced from a fermented mash of cereal grain) produced in the United States. American whiskeys made from mashes with at least 51% of their named grains include bourbon whiskey, rye whiskey, ...

) is sometimes used as a musical instrument, being played with buzzed lips to produce a

trombone The trombone (german: Posaune, Italian, French: ''trombone'') is a musical instrument in the brass family. As with all brass instruments, sound is produced when the player's vibrating lips cause the air column inside the instrument to vibrate ...

-like tone. It is often part of a

jug band A jug band is a band employing a jug player and a mix of conventional and homemade instruments. These homemade instruments are ordinary objects adapted to or modified for making sound, like the washtub bass, washboard, spoons, bones, stovepi ...

, to which ensemble it lends its name.

Examples

A variety of containers are sometimes called “jugs”. File:WHISKEY JUG WITH BEAR.JPG,

Stoneware Stoneware is a rather broad term for pottery or other ceramics fired at a relatively high temperature. A modern technical definition is a vitreous or semi-vitreous ceramic made primarily from stoneware clay or non-refractory fire clay. Whether vi ...

whiskey jug File:Hamilton and Inches Claret jug.jpg, Hamilton and Inches

silver claret jug A silver claret jug is a wine jug made of glass and silver for claret, which is the British name for French red Bordeaux wine. From the introduction of claret to Britain in 1663 specific vessels soon began to be designed to contain the wine and ...

, Edinburgh 1902 File:Somerset Cider Jugs (2518375463).jpg, Cider jugs. Somerset, England File:DublinSterlingSilverHotWaterJug.jpg, Silver hot water jug, Dublin c1770, using a coffee-pot shape with a higher base. File:Bartmen (5159258939).jpg, Two 17th-century German

Bartmann jug A Bartmann jug (from German ', "bearded man"), also called a Bellarmine jug, is a type of decorated salt-glazed stoneware that was manufactured in Europe throughout the 16th and 17th centuries, especially in the Cologne region, in what is today w ...

s File:Refilling 18L water jug bottled water 5219.JPG, 18 L refillable plastic water jug File:Milk jug upright.jpg, Blow molded plastic bottle of milk; sometimes called a “milk jug” in America File:64 fluid ounce Growler style beer bottle in brown glass with a screw top cap.jpg, A growler beer bottle or “jug” File:Glass juglet with vertical ribbing MET DP141682.jpg, Roman glass juglet with vertical ribbing. 2nd half of 1st century C.E. File:Enamel wash basin and jug, South Africa.jpg, Enamel

wash-basin A sink is a bowl-shaped plumbing fixture for washing hands, dishwashing, and other purposes. Sinks have a tap (faucet) that supply hot and cold water and may include a spray feature to be used for faster rinsing. They also include a drain to ...

and jug File:Portugal. (A man carrying a jug.) - NARA - 541753.jpg, Man with a jug, Portugal, 1950 File:Khalili Collection Islamic Art gls 0587.jpg, alt=Jug that is pale green glass with bluish-grey tinge; mould-blown, trail-decorated and tooled. Decoration consists of a row of six figures with prominent headdresses or haloes, one on each facet of the body. The figures are represented in frontal view, standing with their arms by their sides, each holding an object. They are dressed in knee-length garments, their legs somewhat apart and their feet shown from the side. Some of the figures may be musicians – two hold what appear to be flutes – but the remaining objects are not clear enough to be identifiable, Syro-Palestinian coast, or possibly Egypt. 8th-11th century AD.

Khalili Collection The Khalili Collections are eight distinct art collections assembled by Nasser D. Khalili over five decades. Together, the collections include some 35,000 works of art, and each is considered among the most important in its field. Among these ...

References

External links