hack-hammer

1) This was probably a short-handled tool with an iron cutting edge which could be reversed and used as a hammer.

Stone-masons used hack-hammers which were adze-like tools and they are described in cutlers’ records as adze-shaped, with a curved face. It is noted particularly in the wills of metal founders: 1493 ij hak hammers, York

1512 Item vj hakehamerz xd, York

1516 Item iij hake hamars iiijd, York. In more recent times it was a tool used for trueing up gritstone wheels: George Harrison was a Sheffield cutler who specialised in finishing knives to a high standard, and when he died in 1690 his tools included a hackhamer . In 1402, a York metal worker who was described as a ‘potter’ bequeathed to one of his servants j hakkynghamer, ij files et porcionem de spindels.

places York Sheffield
dates 1402 1493 1512 1516 1690

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Photo by Kreuzschnabel CC BY-SA 3.0