Description:
Wooden hatchel with iron spikes. Hatchels, also known as hetchels, were used to comb flax fibers in preparation for spinning and weaving. The name comes from a late 15th-century English word (hackle) meaning to prick or pierce. The long iron teeth aligned the flax fibers, separating out the shorter ones from the longer fibers desired for spinning into yarns suitable for weaving linen. As many as five hatchels of increasingly finely spaced teeth could be used to refine the flax before spinning. This example is a larger, more coarse hatchel. Miss Margaret C. Whiting (1860-1946) gift to PVMA, listed in the Domestic Room as "112. Belonged to "Uncle Bill" Russell."

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https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+69.1121

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