From the fourteenth century the custom of classifying nails according to the original price per hundred became increasingly common, so a fivepenny nail was a nail which cost 5d a hundred.
A structure extending into the sea or the waters of a tidal river, designed to form a partial enclosure protective of shipping, and a place where goods might be loaded and unloaded.
Pig-iron is produced in a furnace by smelting iron ore with a high-carbon fuel: charcoal was used in earlier centuries and then later coke. The molten iron thus produced is run off into rough moulds where it solidifies and forms ‘pigs’.
This was an Old English word for a garment and it derived ultimately from Latin pellis, that is ‘skin’ or ‘hide’. In some early examples these were made of expensive fur.
A substantial length of timber, usually oak or elm, with the lower end sharpened, sometimes tipped with iron. They were used in the construction of weirs, dams, fish-garths, bridges and the like.
Originally a type of small vessel from the Low Countries, first referred to in English sources in 1471 (OED). In Yorkshire, such boats were in use along the coast and inland waterways but there is evidence later that they were capable of sea-crossings.