Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
These tools would have been part of the hewer's equipment, kept in the cut-
ting shed where all the setting out and cutting of architectural enrichments
took place. Hugh May supplied such a place at Whitehall Palace in 1668:
1. A shed was built in the Pebble Court for the working of the cut, rubbed and
gauged brick. The mouldings were 'hewn' in brick… and two square niches…
(Colvin, 1976, 272).
We can determine how much gauged work was being emphasised as a neces-
sary craft skill for the seventeenth-century craftsman city bricklayer by extract-
ing the full meaning behind Moxon's descriptions of the tools and how they
were to be used (Moxon, 1703, 245-8):
2. A Brick Ax, with which they cut Bricks to what fhape they pleafe, as fome for
Arches both ftreight and Circular, others for the mouldings of Architecture, as
Archytrave Friez and Cornice.
The brick axe was, as detailed earlier, the chief cutting or hewing tool and
remained identical to the earlier models. Moxon reveals it was not only for cut-
ting arch voussoirs, but also shaping mouldings for enrichments.
3. A Saw made of Tinn, to faw the Bricks which they cut.
Later termed a 'grub saw', and measuring about 150 mm long 75 mm high with
1-2mm thick in-line serrated teeth. Shown as having a long wooden handle
fixed to the centre of the saw blade giving two cutting edges, this was to give
an extra blade, as the teeth would wear relatively quickly even on soft rubbers.
Also it is not impossible that there were two different sets of teeth. Some older
craftsmen still refer to cutting with a grub saw as 'tinning', or that a brick had
been 'tinned' (i.e. ready for cutting to shape).
This tin saw (most likely tin-plate) would have been used in three ways. First,
to cut a deep (5 mm) line into the bricks around the straight edges of a tem-
plet to give the brick axe a good start and preventing chipped, or 'spalled,
arrises (edges) when cutting to shape. Second, to cut straight sections. Third,
to cut a series of parallel slots above and down to the scribed lines for aiding
easy removal by axing and abrading to profile.
4. A Rub-ftone, which is round, and is about fourteen Inches Diameter, and fome-
times more of lefs at pleafure, on which they rub the Bricks which they cut into
feveral fhapes, and also others which they cut not, being call'd Rubbed Returns,
and Rubbed Headers and Stretchers.
Also called a 'rubbing stone', usually of York stone and round on plan
although it could be square. It has traditionally been round, as of the rubbing
