Hammer
Hammer (ham"mẽr) , noun
[Old English hamer, Anglo-Saxon hamer, hamor; akin to Dutch hamer, German & Danish hammer, Swedish hammare, Icelandic hamarr, hammer, crag, and perh. to Greek 'a`kmwn anvil, Sanskrit acman stone.]
1.
An instrument for driving nails, beating metals, and the like, consisting of a head, usually of steel or iron, fixed crosswise to a handle.
With busy hammers closing rivets up.
2.
(Anatomy) Something which in form or action resembles the common hammer
(a)
(Anatomy) That part of a clock which strikes upon the bell to indicate the hour.
(b)
(Anatomy) The padded mallet of a piano, which strikes the wires, to produce the tones.
(c)
(Anatomy) The malleus.
(d)
(Anatomy) That part of a gunlock which strikes the percussion cap, or firing pin; the cock; formerly, however, a piece of steel covering the pan of a flintlock musket and struck by the flint of the cock to ignite the priming.
(e)
(Anatomy) Also, a person or thing that smites or shatters; as, St. Augustine was the hammer of heresies.
He met the stern legionaries [of Rome] who had been the “massive iron hammers” of the whole earth.
3.
(Athletics) A spherical weight attached to a flexible handle and hurled from a mark or ring. The weight of head and handle is usually not less than 16 pounds.
Collocations (6)
Atmospheric hammer , a dead-stroke hammer in which the spring is formed by confined air.
Hammer fish , See Hammerhead.
Hammer hardening , the process of hardening metal by hammering it when cold.
Hammer shell (Zoology) , any species of Malleus, a genus of marine bivalve shells, allied to the pearl oysters, having the wings narrow and elongated, so as to give them a hammer-shaped outline; -- called also hammer oyster.
To bring to the hammer , to put up at auction.
Hammer (-mẽrd) , transitive verb
1.
To beat with a hammer; to beat with heavy blows; as, to hammer iron.
2.
To form or forge with a hammer; to shape by beating.
Hammered money.
3.
To form in the mind; to shape by hard intellectual labor; -- usually with out.
Who was hammering out a penny dialogue.
Hammer , intransitive verb
1.
To be busy forming anything; to labor hard as if shaping something with a hammer.
Whereon this month I have been hammering.
2.
To strike repeated blows, literally or figuratively.
Blood and revenge are hammering in my head.