AN INITIATIVE OF CRAFT REVIVAL TRUST.  Since 1999
Anvil

Metal

Anvil

A block with one flat face on which the smith shapes his metal by hammering. Although all modern anvils are of steel, the use of stone as well as iron is recorded in the archaeological record. Experimental and ethnographic evidence would indicate that wooden anvils would have been used for bloom smithing.
Related terms: Block anvil, Beaked anvil, Stake