A pothook (or pot hook) is an S-shaped

metal A metal (from Greek μέταλλον ''métallon'', "mine, quarry, metal") is a material that, when freshly prepared, polished, or fractured, shows a lustrous appearance, and conducts electricity and heat relatively well. Metals are typi ...

hook for suspending a pot over a

fire Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material (the fuel) in the exothermic chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction Product (chemistry), products. At a certain point in the combustion reaction, called the ignition ...

Usage

While one extremity of the pothook is hooked to the handle of the pot, the other is caught upon an

iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in ...

crane moving on a pivot over the fire. Later

stove A stove or range is a device that burns fuel or uses electricity to generate heat inside or on top of the apparatus, to be used for general warming or cooking. It has evolved highly over time, with cast-iron and induction versions being develope ...

s obviated the necessity for this arrangement, but in the early twentieth century it was still to be seen in great numbers of country

cottage A cottage, during Feudalism in England, England's feudal period, was the holding by a cottager (known as a cotter or ''bordar'') of a small house with enough garden to feed a family and in return for the cottage, the cottager had to provide s ...

s and

farmhouse FarmHouse (FH) is a social fraternity founded at the University of Missouri on April 15, 1905. It became a national organization in 1921. Today FarmHouse has 33 active chapters and four associate chapters (formerly colonies) in the United State ...

kitchen A kitchen is a room or part of a room used for cooking and food preparation in a dwelling or in a commercial establishment. A modern middle-class residential kitchen is typically equipped with a stove, a sink with hot and cold running water ...

s all over

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

, and in small artisan's houses in the West Midlands and the North.

Writing

In the elementary teaching of writing, a

glyph A glyph () is any kind of purposeful mark. In typography, a glyph is "the specific shape, design, or representation of a character". It is a particular graphical representation, in a particular typeface, of an element of written language. A g ...

of similar shape is called a pothook.

Gallery

File:Camp Cooking Pot Hook.svg, A wooden camp cooking pot hook File:2013_Japan_-_Takamori_Dengaku_Hozonaki_(11148675595).jpg, A Japanese

Irori An ''irori'' (, ) is a traditional Japanese sunken hearth fired with charcoal. Used for heating the home and for cooking food, it is essentially a square, stone-lined pit in the floor, equipped with an adjustable pothook – called a ''j ...

with Jizaikagi File:BLW Wrought Iron Pot-Hook.jpg, A wrought iron pot hook File:Spitzfeder mit Strich und Schriftbeispiel.jpg, A steel nib with a sample of writing (A b c: the ascender of the "b" is an example of a pothook) File:Jäppilä.vaakuna.svg, Pothook pictured in the coat of arms of Jäppilä

Usage

Writing

Gallery

References and notes

See also