"Tenter" redirects here. For the specialised oven also known as a Tenter, see Stenter.
Tenter hook in an 1822 trade catalogue, published by H. Barns & Sons, of Birmingham, EnglandTenterhooks on what may be the world's last remaining 18th-century tenter frames at Otterburn Mill, Northumberland
Tenterhooks or tenter hooks are hooked nails in a device called a tenter. Tenters were wooden frames which were used as far back as the 14th century in the process of making woollencloth. They are now superseded by stenter pins.
The phrase "on tenterhooks" has become a metaphor for nervous anticipation.
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