[OE. fýrpanne, f. fýr, FIRE + panne, PAN.]
1. A pan or receptacle for holding or carrying fire, e.g., a brazier, a chafing dish, a portable grate.
c. 1000. Ælfric, Gloss., in Wr.-Wülcker, 124. Arula, uel batilla fyrpanne.
1382. Wyclif, Ex. xxxviii. 3. Fleshhokes, hokes, and fier pannes.
1432. E. E. Wills (1882), 91. A vergyous barell, and a fyerpanne.
1567. Inv. Sir G. Conyers, in Wills & Inv. N. C. (Surtees), 267. A poer, a fier pann and a pair of tonngs xxd.
a. 1639. Spottiswood, Hist. Ch. Scot., VI. xiii. (1655), 306. That the Kings Houses of Lochmaben and Annand, with the Watch-tower called Repentance, be repaired, a great bell and fire-pan put into it.
a. 1661. Holyday, Juvenal, 58/1. The Romans … had fire-pans (or chafing dishes) placed in their baskets.
1767–9. S. Paterson, Another Traveller! II. 141. He next takes the pipe in one hand and the fire-pan in the other.
1833. J. Holland, Manuf. Metal, II. 158. The portable brazier, or fire-pan, which might be used in any apartment requiring to be warmed.
† 2. A pan for heating anything over a fire. Obs.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts (1658), 285. Hold it in a firepan over the fire untill it be baked so hard as it may be made in powder.
1638. Rawley, trans. Bacon’s Life & Death (1650), 44. To poure them upon a Fire-pan somewhat heated.
† 3. The pan which held the priming of a flintlock gun. Obs.
1613. T. Jackson, Comm. Apostles Creede, I. 192. This was but as a little flash in the fire-panne.
† 4. A kind of firework. Obs.
c. 1793. in Spirit Pub. Jrnls. (1799), I. 91. They ran about the streets, shouting and roaring like madmen; letting off fire-pans of all sizes; firing crackers, which they learned to make of us Chinese; and breaking the windows, and setting fire to the houses of the more peaceable inhabitants.
5. Mining. ‘A kind of fire-lamp’ (Gresley, Gloss. Coal Mining, 1883).
