Forms: see TENTER sb.1; also 5 tayntyr-, tentyr-, 6 tentur-, 7 tentry-. [f. TENTER sb.1 + HOOK sb.]
1. One of the hooks or bent nails set in a close row along the upper and lower bar of a tenter, by which the edges of the cloth are firmly held; a hooked or right-angled nail or spike; dial. a metal hook upon which anything is hung.
1480. Wardr. Acc. Edw. IV. (1830), 13.9 Tentourhokes, cc.
1492–3. Rec. St. Mary at Hill, 186. Item, for tayntyrhokes and ffor wachyng of the sepulture, xij d.
a. 1518. Skelton, Magnyf., 1002. Her naylys sharpe as tenter hokys!
1579. in Feuillerat, Revels Q. Eliz. (1908), 324. Tainter Hookes at viiid the c.
a. 1683. Sidney, Disc. Govt., III. xxxii. (1704), 369. The King of Marocco may stab his Subjects, throw them to the Lions, or hang them upon tenterhooks.
1688. R. Holme, Armoury, III. 348/1. The Tentry Hook is a Nail with a crooked Head, yet sharp pointed, that it may strike into any thing hung upon it.
1777. Howard, Prisons Eng. (1780), 404. The partition between this and the garden … strong palisades with tenter-hooks.
1825. Waterton, Wand. S. Amer., III. iii. 254. On examining his teeth I found that they were all bent like tenter-hooks, pointing down his throat.
1888. Sheffield Gloss., Tenter-hooks, the hooks upon which the valances of a bed are hung.
1889. N. W. Linc. Gloss. (ed. 2), Tenter-hooks, strong iron hooks put in ceilings and … joists…, on which bacon and other such things are hung.
b. transf. = TENTER sb.1 2 b.
1665. Hooke, Microgr., xxxv. 164. It was arm’d likewise with the like Tenterhooks or claws with those of the sheath.
1713. Derham, Phys.-Theol., To Rdr. 6. The Beards (or Tenter-hooks [of a bee’s sting] as Dr. Hook calls them) lie only on one side of each Spear, not all round them.
1816. Kirby & Sp., Entomol., xxiii. (1818), II. 323. These tenter-hooks in the suckers of flies … are mere fancies.
2. fig. That on which something is stretched or strained; something that causes suffering or painful suspense. Cf. TENTER sb.1 3.
1532. More, Confut. Barnes, VIII. Wks. 797/1. The churche … is stretched out in the stretcher or tenter hookes of the crosse, as a churche well washed and cleansed.
1601. Chester, Love’s Mart. (1878), 138. Ract on the tenter-hookes of foule disgrace.
1823. Byron, Juan, XIV. xcvii. [It] keeps the atrocious reader in suspense; The surest way for ladies and for books To bait their tender or their tenter-hooks.
b. esp. in phrases to put, set, strain, stretch on the tenter-hooks: to strain, distort the sense of (words) (? obs.); to strain (conscience, truth, authority, credit, etc.) beyond the proper, normal, or natural extent, limit, or scope; to put a strain on (a faculty, power, or capacity). Now rare.
1583. Stubbes, Anat. Abus., II. (1882), 29. He racketh it, straineth it, and as it were so setteth it on the tenter hookes.
1603. H. Crosse, Vertues Commw. (1878), 58. By setting the conscience on the tainter-hookes, to rise vp by his fall.
1630. R. Johnson’s Kingd. & Commw., 134. Nor doe I here stretch my discourse on the tenter-hookes of partiality.
1700. W. King, Transactioneer, 57. The poor People have set their Wits, as if it were on the Tenter-hooks, to make Turnep-Bread in Essex.
1841. D’Israeli, Amen. Lit. (1867), 213 (Invent. Printing). Honest men … sometimes strain truth on the tenter-hooks of fiction.
c. To be on (the) tenter-hooks: i.e., in a state of painful suspense or impatience: cf. TENTER sb.1 3 b.
1748. Smollett, Rod. Rand., xlv. I left him upon the tenter-hooks of impatient uncertainty.
1812. Sir R. Wilson, Pr. Diary (1861), I. 127. Until I reach the imperial headquarters I shall be on tenter-hooks.
1894. Eugenia Morris, A Hilltop Summer, i. 11. Out with it if you’ve got anythin’ to say, an’ don’t keep me on tenter hooks no longer.
1897. Sat. Rev., 25 Dec., 754/1. The author keeps … the reader … on tenterhooks.
3. attrib.
1576. Fleming, trans. Caius’ Dogs (1880), 37. This dogge … is violent in fighting, & wheresoeuer he setteth his tenterhooke teeth, he taketh such sure & fast holde, that a man may sooner teare and rende him in sunder, then lose him and seperate his chappes.
1907. Westm. Gaz., 12 Sept., 2/1. What may be called ‘tenterhook living’ or existence on the crust of a volcano.
Hence † Tenter-hooking a., laying hold with tenter-hooks (in quot. fig.).
1615. Brathwait, Strappado (1878), 197. Avoid such tenter-hooking men.
