Under-glass of bier

General information

The majority of the under-glasses of bier are round or square, but there exists about it of all the conceivable forms with a range of very wide impression because, more and more, the under-glasses of bier are used as advertizing medium for very different sectors. Thus, there exist coasters for brandy glasses, the glasses of bier of one liter, or of the paperboards to the format of plates of service to the maximum format. It is also possible to produce perforated under-glasses of bier, to hang (for Christmas 2006, the company Leffe distributed some which imitated in 2D balls for fir tree) where to thread on a spade, under-glasses of bier provided with slits, intended to be embedded, under-glasses of bier double, for two glasses, for example, or glass and a bottle. These models also are very snuffed collectors.

In spite of its apparent archaism, the under-glasses of bier is a current means, vector conveyer of notes but also of publicity. Considering, read, handled by more 80% of the consumers and then carried. He became means of communication and of information!

Functions of the under-glass of bier

the function first of the under-glass of bier is to recover the water of Condensation, which is formed when cold beer glass comes into contact with the hotter ambient air, and which runs out along glass.
It acts also as advertizing medium, in particular for the Brasserie S.
In certain countries, it is employed by the waiters to note the number of consumption of the customers.
Its back, sometimes but seldom from now on, virgin of any impression, enables him to become a memorandum.

One also uses it for certain plays of address (houses of cards). The play more the current consists in posing a paperboard on the edge of the table by letting it approximately exceed a quarter in its diameter. Of a blow of the end of the fingers, upwards, the palm directed to the bottom, one makes him make a half-turn in the air before catching up with it by advancing the hand and by gripping it between the inch and the other fingers. One places then two under-glasses of bier one on the other and one starts again, so on…

Another play consists in holding between the teeth a under-glass of bier on which is posed glass of Schnaps and to pass it to its neighbor at table so on. At the end of a certain number of master keys , the under-glass of bier humidified by the drops of reversed schnapps and saliva will tend to soften and glass will be likely to fall. One can then decide not to take the under-glass of bier between his teeth but to take glass with the hand and to drink it and to pay it, the preceding player having to pay it. If one makes fall glass, one pays a round…

In the Biergärten of Bavaria, it is of use to pose the under-glass of bier on glass (like a lid of Chope) to prevent that the flowers or the fruits Chestnut tree S, or the insects do not penetrate there.

History

The origin of the hard-bound under-glasses of bier that we know today goes back to the end of the 19th century. He was probably invented in Germany, ground brewery par excellence.

In 1880, the company of printing works and boarding Friederich Horn de Buckau, close to Magdeburg in Germany, cut out coasters out of paperboard on which it printed various reasons.

In 1883, Robert Sputh of Dresden (Saxony, Germany) invented the precursor of the current under-glass of bier made out of wood felt. The coarse paper pulp versed in round moulds and was dried with the air. These wood felt discs had a diameter of 107 mm and a thickness of 5 Misters.

The under-glass of bier appears in France the June 24th 1892, date on which a patent for a " saucer éponge" was deposited with Paris. A famous French brewery published besides a series of commemorative under-glasses of bier in 1992 to celebrate the 100e birthday of this event.

Finally in 1903, Casimir Otto Katz, originating in the Black Forest (Bade-Wurtemberg, Germany), started industrially to manufacture the under-glasses of bier which we know today. They were manufactured starting from wood of spruce whose long fibers are very absorbing.

In 1936, the construction of the paper machine with long table of fabric and driers suspended was the starting point of a production of under-glasses of bier which appeared as modern as massive. Various methods manufacture transfer the day, such as for example very widespread moulding-pressing in the Fifties and disappeared today. The under-glasses of bier built thus are thicker than those which we know today and present a different relief on the 2 faces.

Today the majority of the under-glasses of bier are made out of paperboard natural or bleached approximately 1,5 mm thickness, printed in Sérigraphie or offsets, then cut out.

See too

Passe-partout mounting
Tégestophilie
Cervalobélophilie
Beer

External bonds

IBV - Int. Brauereikultur-Verband e.V. : International association of collectors of under-glasses of bier, since 1958
an impressive collection of under-glasses of bier.
a collection of old Alsatian under-glasses of bier.
a manufacturer of under-glasses of bier.