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This is an excerpt from An Anonymous Andalusian Cookbook
(Andalusia, 13th c. - Charles Perry, trans.)
The original source can be found at David Friedman's website

Of the Utensils that Those Charged with Cooking or Pharmacy Must Have Ready. A mortar, of white marble or of a hard wood such as chestnut, terebinth, olive, ash, boxwood, or jujube, prepared for pounding things that should by no means be pounded in copper: salt, garlic, cilantro, onion, mustard, mint, citron [leaves] and other plants and greens; and fruits, like apples, quince, and pomegranate, and meat and fat, almonds, stuffings for ka'k and bread foods, and anything else that is moist or fatty, above all if left in copper until it turns green, is altered and takes on a bad state. Of this hard wood are the spoons and ladles; and the board on which meat is cut, and the board on which ka'k and bread foods are rolled out. It should be smooth and extremely polished; and likewise the utensil with which mirkâs is made should be of white glass, glassy ceramic, or hard wood, because if it is of copper, the holes through which the ground sausage-meat passes turn green, and that mixes with the meat and it alters, as has been explained.