Meaning & use
tenterhook
One of the hooks once used to hold cloth stretched taut on a drying frame, chiefly recalled today in the phrase 'on tenterhooks.'
See it in a sentence
Historically, weavers fixed damp wool onto tenterhooks so it would dry without shrinking.
The museum displayed a row of old tenterhooks once used in the wool trade.
A note on using this word
Almost always used in the plural idiom 'on tenterhooks' (in anxious suspense); the singular is rarely used alone today.
Words with a similar meaning
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