jan 1, 1592 - fore-hammer

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The OED has examples from 1543 and gives the meaning as ‘the large hammer which strikes first; a sledge-hammer’. In early Yorkshire references the contexts are interesting: 1445 <i>Willelmus Routh … camsmyth …unum stethy de ferro, vocato bighorn, unum slek trough et unum forehamer</i>, York (SS30/116); 1543 <i>iiij forehamers … iiij showing hamers … ij hande hamers … ij nalyng hamers … a hake hamer with a platyng hamer</i>, Ripley (SS26/43); 1592 <i>a fore hammer a hand hammer a shewing hammer</i>, South Cave (Kaner183). Among the bequests of the Sheffield smith Richard Hobson in 1550 were <i>a pare of gret tonges, a pare of little tonges, a borne axe and a fore hamber</i>, all to his <i>Prentise William Hawll</i> and <i>a stethy</i> to Richard Fyrthe (TWH11/95-6).

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