Charcoal sb.

Forms: 4–7 charcole, 5 charcolle, charkole, 6 chark(e cole, (colle, coole), cherke cole, charecole, 7 charcoll, charcoale, charecoale, char-cole, charcoale, charr-coale, 7–8 char-coal, 7– charcoal. [The first element is of uncertain origin; from the earliest instances it appears to be char; charke, cherke, found from beg. of 16th c., being app. due to erroneous analysis of the spoken word, and having no independent origin or meaning, though afterwards (in 17th c.) used as an independent word. A current suggestion is that char- is an application of CHARE v. or sb.¹, as if turn-coal, i.e., wood turned or converted into coal; but for this no actual evidence has been found.

  The name ‘coal’ itself originally meant ‘charcoal’ (collier being a ‘charcoal-burner’), and no satisfactory explanation appears of the introduction of the name charcoal in the same sense, esp. as there is no contemporary reference to ‘earth-coal,’ ‘stone-coal,’ ‘pit-coal,’ or ‘sea-coal’ (as mineral coal was, for various reasons, called). See COAL.]

  1.  The black porous pulverizable substance, consisting (when pure) wholly of carbon, obtained as the solid residue in the imperfect combustion of wood, bones, and other vegetable or animal matter. Hence specified as wood charcoal, vegetable charcoal, animal charcoal. † Pit charcoal, coke (obs.).

c. 1340.  Gaw. & Gr. Knt., 875. A cheyer by-fore þe chemné, þer charcole brenned.

c. 1420.  Anturs of Arth., xxxv. A schimnay of charcole, to chaufen the knyȝte.

c. 1440.  Promp. Parv., 69. Charcole [Pynson charkole], carbo.

1470–1.  Mem. Ripon (Surtees), III. 216. Ij skeppis carbonum vocatorum charcole.

1514.  Acc. Churchw. St. Dunstan’s Canterb., in Archæol. Cantiana, XVII. 79. Item for ij quarters of charecole.

1562.  Act 5 Eliz., c. 4 § 6. Working … of any … Stone, Sea cole, stone cole, Moore cole or cherke cole.

1624.  Capt. Smith, Virginia, III. 85. The President pittying the poore naked Salvage in the dungeon, sent him victuall and some Char-coale for a fire.

1626.  Bacon, Sylva, § 775. Sea-coal last longer than Char-coal; and Char-coal of Roots, being coaled into great pieces, last longer than ordinary Char-coal.

1656.  H. More, Enthus. Tri., 26. The fumes of Charcoale, that has often made men fall down dead.

1662.  Stillingfl., Orig. Sacr., I. vii. § 5. 213. A picture drawn in Charcoale.

1770.  Priestley, Charcoal, in Phil. Trans., LX. 214. The inside of all pieces of pit charcoal is full of cavities.

1838.  T. Thomson, Chem. Org. Bodies, 755. Animal charcoal is a much more powerful discolouring principle than vegetable charcoal.

1864.  Longf., Wayside Inn, 119. A figure in shovel hat Drawn in charcoal on the wall.

1865.  Jevons, Coal Quest. (ed. 2), 299. Until the middle of the last century, however, iron was always made with charcoal, and a woody country was necessarily its seat.

1875.  Ure, Dict. Arts, I. 764. Animal charcoal especially … has been much employed in the construction of filters.

  † b.  = CARBON. Obs.

1800.  trans. Lagrange’s Chem., I. 57. Charcoal, the base of animal and vegetable matters, is widely diffused.

  † c.  ? = CARBONATE.

1790.  Priestley, in Phil. Trans., LXXX. 107. I heated charcoal of copper in 41 ounce measures of dephlogisticated air.

  † 2.  collect. pl. in sense of 1. Obs.

1489.  Caxton, Faytes of A., II. xxi. 135. Thre thousand sackes of charcolys made of wilowe tree.

1493.  Festivall (W. de W., 1515), 25. A man that made charke coles in a wood.

1557.  Ludlow Churchw. Acc. (Camden), 76. Item, for charke cooles.

1598.  Manwood, Lawes Forest, xxv. i. (1615), 253/2. Charecoales of Brouse wood.

1610.  Holland, Camden’s Brit. (1637), 302. Croidon … is very well known … for char-coles which the townsmen make good chaffers of.

1719.  D’Urfey, Pills (1872), III. 111. Those glowing Char-coals.

  3.  A charcoal pencil or crayon for drawing.

1688.  R. Holme, Armoury, III. 144/2. Charcoals are Sallow Wood, or Withy Burnt and split into the form of Pencils, and sharpened to a Point.

  4.  Short for Charcoal drawing.

1884.  American, VIII. 59. A few good charcoals, but this last branch … seems to be sadly neglected by our own artists.

  5.  pl. ‘The name by which the best tin plates are known; these are always made by charcoal fires’ (Ure, Dict. Arts, I. 767).

  6.  attrib. and Comb., as charcoal-basket, -dust, -fire, -man, -merchant, -poultice, -powder; charcoal-black, a pigment obtained from charcoal; charcoal-burner, one whose occupation it is to make charcoal by burning wood, etc.; so charcoal-burning; † charcoal-collier = charcoal-burner; charcoal-filter, a filter in which charcoal is used to absorb impurities; charcoal-furnace, a furnace in which charcoal is made by dry distillation of wood; charcoal-iron, iron containing a certain percentage of carbon; charcoal-oven = charcoal-furnace; charcoal-point (Electr.) = carbon-point; see CARBON 2, 3 c.

a. 1658.  Cleveland, Gen. Poems (1677), 15.

1622.  Peacham, Compl. Gentl., xiii. (1634), 132. For the teeth, take white Lead, and shaddow it with *Char-coale blacke.

1841.  W. Spalding, Italy & It. Isl., I. 257. A few *charcoal-burners among the brakes.

1863.  Watts, Dict. Chem., I. 759. If the supply of air is limited, only the more volatile ingredients [of wood] burn away, and the greater part of the carbon remains behind. This is the principle of the process of *charcoal-burning.

1636.  Althorp MS., in Simpkinson, Washingtons, Introd. 78. To the *charcoal colliers uppon my lordes guift towardes the buying of their sackes 00 03 06.

1800.  trans. Lagrange’s Chem., I. 101. Add to it as much very dry *charcoal-dust.

1681.  Chetham, Angler’s Vade-m., xxxix. § 2 (1689), 254. A clear *Charcoal or Wood-coal Fire.

1801.  W. Coxe, Tour Monmonth., I. 3. Tintern Abby, *charcoal furnace, forges, and wire-works.

1858.  Greener, Gunnery, 166. *Charcoal iron has … been the only stub twist barrels they … have ever been served with.

1861.  Lond. Rev., 16 Feb., 167. The charcoal iron of Newland and Backbarrow, near Ulverston … unrivalled in quality.

1870.  Daily News, 14 April, 2/3. The rope is of charcoal iron, and two inches in circumference.

1875.  Ure, Dict. Arts, III. 895. With an admixture of charcoal pig-iron.

1697.  trans. C’tess. D’Aunoy’s Trav. (1706), 245. A hundred *Charcoal-men … provide the Wood, which is to burn those that are condemned to the Fire.

1830.  Scott, Ivanhoe, Introd. The … romance of Rauf Colziar, in which Charlemagne is introduced as the unknown guest of a charcoal-man.

1781.  Gibbon, Decl. & F., II. 30. His Father … exercised trade of a *charcoal-merchant.

1878.  trans. Ziemssen’s Cycl. Med., XVII. 463. In the immediate vicinity of *charcoal-ovens.

c. 1865.  Letheby, in Circ. Sc., I. 136/1. If the *charcoal-points are too close together.

1876.  Bartholow, Mat. Med. (1879), 553. A *charcoal-poultice differs from an ordinary poultice in having powdered charcoal incorporated with the mass.

1881.  Syd. Soc. Lex., Cataplasma carbonis … The charcoal poultice. For correcting the fœtor … of ill-conditioned ulcers.

1855.  J. F. Johnston, Chem. Com. Life, I. 81. *Charcoal powder darkens … the flowers of the dahlia.