served as Master-General from 1693 to 1702. However, as noted by the Oxford English Dictionary, "this is not supported by the evidence", as the use of the device predates the association of either Sidney with the Board. The earliest known use of the symbol in what seems to be an official capacity is in 1330, on the seal used by Richard de la Pole as butler to King Edward III. In 1383, it is recorded that a member of the butlery staff, having selected a pipe of wine for the King's use, "signo regio capiti sagitte consimili signavit" ("marked it with the royal sign like an arrowhead"). In 1386, Thomas Stokes was condemned to stand in the pillory by the Court of Aldermen of London for the offence of having impersonated an officer of the royal household, in which role he had commandeered several barrels of ale from brewers, marking them with a symbol referred to as an "arewehead". The device was also used in the 15th and 16th centuries as an assay mark for pewter and tin. An alternative theory is that the device used on naval stores and property was in its origins a simplified and corrupted version of an anchor symbol. Thus, a set of "Instructions for marking of Timber for His Majesty's Navy" issued in 1609 commands: Later use A letter sent by Thomas Gresham to the Privy Council in 1554, relating to the shipment of 50 cases of Spanish reals (coins) from Seville to England, explained that each case was "marked with the broad arrow and numbered from 1 to 50". A proclamation of Charles I issued in 1627 ordered that tobacco imported to England from non-English plantations should be sealed with "a seale engraven with a broad Arrow and a Portcullice". A proclamation issued by Charles II in 1661 ran: An Order in Council of 1664, relating to the requisitioning of merchant ships for naval use, similarly authorised the Commissioners of the Navy "to put the broad arrow on any ship in the River they had a mind to hire, and fit them out for sea"; while the Embezzlement of Public Stores Act 1697 (9 Will. 3, c. 41) sought to prevent the theft of military and naval property by prohibiting anyone other than official contractors from marking "any Stores of War or Naval Stores whatsoever, with the Marks usually used to and marked