jan 1, 1621 - smithies

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The word ‘smithy’ was used for the forge or workshop of a blacksmith but iron works on a larger scale were referred to as ‘smithies’, from the early 1400s at least. A Derbyshire reference suggests that such smithies had a number of ancillary buildings, however modest: 1387 ‘houses, buildings and <i>Smythyhouses</i>’, Barlborough (TWH16/43). In some early Yorkshire examples ‘Smithies’ is a surname, possibly already hereditary: 1425 <i>Thomas del Smythies</i>, Sawley (WF1/11); 1432 <i>de Roberto oftheSmethies</i>, York (SS192/10). Among early West Riding ironworks so named are: 1450 <i>lez Smythiez in Tonge</i> (YRS120/63); 1538 <i>unius Molendini vocati le Yron Smithes</i>, Rievaulx (SS83/312); 1598 <i>Ecclesoule Smithies, </i>Sheffield (WPS159). There is evidence in a Honley deed of how the plural usage may have originated: 1573 <i>quoddam forgam vocat’ a paire of Smythies </i>(YDK85). The alternative ‘smithy place’ has a similar history and the two terms were interchangeable: 1482 <i>usum et occupacionem tenure de Hundesworth et fabrice ibidem vocate Smythplace</i> (Th22/244); 1507 <i>a Syte of a Smethe place to bylde an Irnesmethe both blome herth and strynge herth</i> and also the <i>Course of the Water … to turne the said Smethes</i>, Hazlebarrow, Norton (TWH14/124). In <i>Spen Valley Past and Present</i> (1893), Peel quotes the following: 1608 <i>one tenement made into two dwellings called the Smythies Place where some time stood Iron Smythies long since decayed</i>. Such ‘smithies’ are distinct from the plural of ‘smithy’ as a blacksmith’s forge: in 1557 property leased to Francis Swift of Sheffield included <i>tooe cotages and tooe smethes</i> on <i>the northweste syde of … Pinchen Crofte</i> (TWH16/105): a lease of Sir Francis Wortley’s ironworks in 1621 covered <i>All those Iron Smythees … with all houses, buildings, stringe hearths, bloom hearths, dames, streames, goats </i>[leats]<i> and water-courses thereunto belonging … with all the bellowes, tools and implements now at the said smythees</i> (Andrew22). Smithies and Smithy Place are still relatively common place-names in the West Riding.

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