It started innocently enough

 

A comment online reminded me that I thought there was a bit in Scappi that talks about specific crackers on a sideboard, so I reviewed the translation I have (Scully) where he’s used ‘biscuits’ to describe the thing, which - because he’s British - implies, in the context with the other things listed, that it’s something sweet rather than savoury. I was dubious, because biscuit could also mean “neutral or savory substrate” so I found a digitised version of the original Italian, where the word he’d translated to ‘biscuit’ was mostaccioli. Modern mostaccioli are definitely sweet, and basically every region has a version, but a bit of digging indicates that they’ve evolved, over time, from something that was definitely closer to neutral or balanced. I managed to find a site that has both ‘ancient’ and ‘renaissance’ reasonably plausible recipes for mostaccioli, but in translating the larger passage from Scappi, I also discovered ciambelle, which is another ‘could be sweet, could be savory’ biscuit/cracker/cookie situation that has murky origins, but I actually managed to shelve that topic for another time (go me!). MEANWHILE, one of the things I read about mostaccioli described the ’historic' use of wooden moulds in the ‘traditional’ rhombus shape, so I, naturally, did a lil’ search to see if I could a) find any that b) were with a Florentine fleur de lis, because food with badges is a thing. I didn’t find any, but what I did find were moulds for corzetti (which are pasta rounds) and that’s how I ended up with a corzetti mould with a Florentine fleur de lis on one side and a spiral on the other, a fold-up pasta drying rack, a blue cheese knife, and six olive forks.

The moral of the story, kids, is always go back to the primary source material.