stithy

1) An anvil: a word with an Old Norse origin which is on record from <i>a</i>.1295 (OED).

Examples are frequent in Yorkshire from the fourteenth century: 1374 lego Willielmo consanguineo meo unum magnum stythy [a great stithy], York

1445 Johanni Ulron, unum stethy de ferro, York

1510 2 stythes … all oder smithy gere, Ecclesfield

1600 all my geare and toyles in the smythye except my stythye, Cottingley. The will of Hugh Sponer of Sheffield in 1539 suggests that some cutlers had much of their capital tied up in anvils for he made bequests of six stethies and they were all in the separate ‘occupation’ of local men. The anvils used by different kinds of smith had a variety of names and some of these are dealt with under bighorn, bolster, crooked stithy, cutting-stithy, and sparrow-hawk: additional names found in the Hallamshire cutlery trade include: 1692 7 box Stythies

1701 one sow metle stithy.

dates 1374 1445 1510 1539 1600 1692

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