Technology: The History of the Hammer
Abby Hobbs
Anthropology 101
Online
Hammers can be dated all the way back to 2.6 million BC. Rocks of different shapes and sizes can be found all over the globe. Hammers were primarily used to shape and break bone, wood, and other stones to create new tools. These hammers, however, did not have handles. They were just the right size to fit in the user’s hand. The most important thing during this time was having a harder tool that could bang out softer materials (D’ Amico, Nenzioni, Casadei, Lenzi, 2015). Other stones that were softer were used to break open nuts as opposed to pummeling other stones. Sometime around 30,000 BC, wooden sticks or bones were tied to these stones using leather strips to create handles. This handle was a great addition, not only because it removed the users hand from the impact sight, but because it helped with the precision of the hit and added more force with each hit (D’ Amico, Nenzioni, Casadei, Lenzi, 2015). Sometimes, the force of the blow literally caused the stone itself to shatter. However, the way these handles were tied, it was very common for the bindings to break loose and for the hammer heads to fly off (D’ Amico, Nenzioni, Casadei, Lenzi, 2015).
During the Bronze Age, or 3000 BC, the technology was good enough to shape some metals. This made attaching handles drastically easier because one could forge a hammer with a hole in the middle for a handle to be slid into. This also lengthened the life of the hammer. However, bronze was not hardened by heating, the metal was worked over repeatedly with another hammer and thus blacksmithing was born. This is the same time that metal nails showed up in ancient Egypt (Wahlberg, 2008).
Around 1500 BC, the Hittites started to forge and smelt iron. However, because their empire collapsed so not much is known about their forging. Although, in 1200 BC forging iron became a common practice all around the world. Iron was also ultimately stronger than bronze so the cultures that actively used iron quickly defeated their bronze using enemies. At this time, blacksmiths started to get creative with the shapes of their hammers. These different shapes allowed them to craft all sorts of items of different shapes, sizes, and contours (Wahlberg, 2008).
During the Roman Empire, the most common hammer was developed. With a wooden handle and an iron head, this is the one that is seen most commonly today. It has a flat head on one side, and a claw on the other to remove nails (Wahlberg, 2008). Since nails were so expensive at this time, removing nails and being able to reuse them was a big deal. Over the next few centuries, blacksmiths continued to experiment and innovate new hammers. They played with the balance, weight, and angles. During these middle ages, the throwing of a blacksmiths hammer became a sport, but the hammer remained mostly unchanged. A lot of blacksmiths switched to iron handles as opposed to wooden handles to increase its life and performance. But in the average, everyday nailing hammer the wooden handle remained because it absorbed the shock of the hit very well (Wahlberg, 2008).
In China, a new hammer driven by animals or a water wheel was invented. This hammer was consistently lifted then dropped to crush and grind grains. Because of the lack of precision though it was not used for much else. Later in the industrial age, an improvement was made to this hammer. This time it was loaded with springs that actually drove force down into the object. This led to greater advancements in metal working (Klemun, 2011). At this time the engineers hammer was also developed, which sported a smaller handle and heavier head. This allowed for easier precision in smaller places (Klemun, 2011).