Tenterhooks, or tenter hooks, are hooked nails used with a device known as a tenter, a wooden frame used since at least the fourteenth century in the process of making woolen cloth, over which wet cloth would be stretched to prevent it shrinking as it dried. The tenterhook has since been superseded by the stenter in the textile manufacturing industry.
Facts
Introduced When (Circa)In use by at least the 14th century, when hooked nails of this kind were driven into the wooden tenter frames used to stretch newly fulled woolen cloth as it dried, to prevent it shrinking. 1 OriginNamed for the tenter, the wooden frame the hooks were driven into to hold stretched, drying cloth, itself from the Latin tendere, to stretch. 1 In the Other Atlases
Era Of Origin
Also in History Atlas: the era this subject comes from.
Source Tenterhook (Wikipedia)Lead sectiontier 2Quote, Lead section
used since at least the 14th century in the process of making woolen cloth
Sources
1. Tenterhook (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationLead section
used since at least the 14th century in the process of making woolen cloth
Cloth-making section
called a tenter (from Latin tendere 'to stretch')
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