"beril" of a ship?

[Michael Quinion]

Charles Doyle queried:

> What IS the distinction between "cask" and "barrel"? OED doesn't make one,
> referring to each in the definition of the other; yet they can't be
> ENTIRELY synonymous--can they?

Writing as the former curator of a museum of cidermaking, I can with some
confidence assert that "cask" and "barrel" are not synonymous, at least
not in the brewing trade. "Cask" is the general term for any wooden vessel
constructed with staves and hoops. "Barrel" is a specific size of cask, in
modern times in the brewery trade in Britain one that holds 36 imperial
gallons (in the US and in other trades, particularly oil, the value is
different, even allowing for the different value of the US gallon).


--
Michael Quinion
Editor, World Wide Words
E-mail: wordseditor at worldwidewords.org
Web: http://www.worldwidewords.org

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org