Making & Using 18th Century Spunks.

These descriptions might be useful and of interest:

Retrospect of a long life: from 1815 to 1883, Vol. 1, Samuel Carter Hall

"Beginning at one of the lowest rungs of Memory's ladder, I carry my readers back to a time when the Tinder-Box was a household god. The “Tinder Box” was the precursor of the lucifer match that can be lit in an instant, and, when quiescent, is enclosed in a case so pretty, that it may be accepted as a graceful gift. Fifty years ago the tinder box was as indispensable as was, and is, the tea-kettle that still sings on the hob---of the kitchen. As an old acquaintance the tinder box is worth describing. It was, more or less, coarsely ornamental, and of varied forms. Ordinarily, it was an oblong wooden box some six or eight inches long and three or four in width, and was divided into two parts by a partition. In one of these was fitted a loose lid with a central knob, to drop in as a “damper” on the tinder; and in the other were kept the flint, steel, and bunches of brimstone matches. The “tinder” was scorched or half-burned linen rag. The flint and steel being struck together emitted sparks, and then, as soon as a spark had fallen upon and ignited the tinder, the brimstone end of a “match” was applied to it, and lit. The matches were thin slips of deal*, five or six inches long and, perhaps, a quarter of an inch wide, cut to a point at each end, and dipped in melted brimstone; they were hawked about the country by itinerant vendors. The fumes of the sulphur emitted a scent by no means pleasant to the olfactory nerves: in fact, the stench was strong enough to find its way from the kitchen to the attic of a lofty mansion! From the match thus ignited, a candle was lit-- of mutton fat usually, of “moulds” where greater cost could be afforded. There were never candles on the table without snuffer-tray and snuffers."
*deal: noun, fir or pine wood,

Sabine Baring-Gould, Strange Survivals, 1892, Devon, England

"In the morning early, before dawn, the first sounds heard in a small house were the click, click, click of the kitchen-maid striking flint and steel over the tinder in the box. When the tinder was ignited, the maid blew upon it till it glowed sufficiently to enable her to kindle a match made of a bit of stick dipped in brimstone. The cover was then returned to the box, and the weight of the flint and steel pressing it down extinguished the sparks in the carbon. The operation was not, however, always successful; the tinder or the matches might be damp, the flint blunt, and the steel worn; or, on a cold, dark morning, the operator would not infrequently strike her knuckles instead of the steel; a match, too, might be often long in kindling, and it was not pleasant to keep blowing into the tinder-box, and on pausing a moment to take breath, to inhale sulphurous acid gas, and a peculiar odour which the tinder-box always exhaled."

Spence

Question for the board...

Does anyone know where the term 'spunks' came from in relation to matches? I can't find it in any of my collected primary material or in anything modern. The usual definition given in modern dictionaries is punky wood or fungi used in starting fires, no mention of sulfur matches by that name.

Anyone?

Spence

I found a reference to "spunks" in a 1796 novel, The History of Ned Evans: by Elizabeth Hervey. It's not sulfur-tipped matches, but I can see how it might be in the same language track. The hero needed light in a cave, so he collected some dried weed stems and twisted them together. He then made a paste of black powder and water and smeared it heavily on the end of his stems. Using the lock of his flintlock rifle he lighted the powder, which set the stems afire into a kind of torch. This torch was referred to as a spunk. He made a supply of them... several spunks... to use as he penetrated the cave.

I think of spalls as long, thin twisted cones of paper used to catch fire in the fireplace to light candles, pipes, etc. I remember a sort of  vase full of ready made ones sitting by the fireplace. Lucifers were one of the first friction matches, and had their head coated with sulfur plus other chemicals, as I recall....maybe circa 1830?

Spence

Spills are made with a rather nifty plane too...
redrosereproductions.com/spill-plane/
redrosereproductions.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/JJS_6735-1024x683.jpg

Spunk.

Mid 16th century (in the sense ‘a spark, vestige’): of unknown origin; perhaps a blend of spark and obsolete funk ‘spark’.

Spunk means “spark” and “touchwood.” Touchwood is what becomes of wood when certain fungi convert it into a soft mass; once ignited, it can burn for hours like tinder. Touchwood is defined in dictionaries by means of its synonym tinder. “Spark” and “flammable substance” are compatible senses. Spunk “spirit, mettle” can be understood as a figurative extension of “tinder.”

The noun funk has been recorded with the following senses: “spark; touchwood (the same as spunk),” “strong smoky smell, especially tobacco smell,” “kick, stroke; anger,” and “fear, panic” (for example, to be in a blue funk). The etymology of each of these senses is problematic, and there can be no certainty that any one of them is connected with any other.

touchwood, tinder, or punk.

ORIGIN OF SPUNK

1530–40; blend of spark1 and obsolete funk spark, touchwood (cognate with Dutch vonk, German Funke)



Definition of spunk

(Entry 1 of 2)

1a: a woody tinder : PUNK

b: any of various fungi used to make tinder



History and Etymology for spunk

Noun

Scottish Gaelic spong sponge, tinder, from Middle Irish spongc, from Latin spongia sponge



spunk (n.)

1530s, "a spark," Scottish, from Gaelic spong "tinder, pith, sponge," from Latin spongia (see sponge (n.)). The sense of "courage, pluck, mettle" is first attested 1773. A similar sense evolution took place in cognate Irish sponnc "sponge, tinder, spark; courage, spunk."



NOUN: A piece of tinder, sometimes impregnated with sulphur; a match. spunk (n.) ... Sponk: A word used in Edinburgh which denotes a match or anything dipped in sulphur that takes fire.

This wooden box for 'spunks' or sulphur matches dates from the early 19th century. It was turned out on a lathe at Kirkpatrick-Durham in Kirkcudbrightshire.

The box is in the form of a barrel which unscrews two-thirds of the way up. It has the initials R.I. (for Robert Innes) on the bottom.

Sulphur matches or 'spunks' have a long history, and may have been used by the Romans. Chemical methods of making fire were developed in the late 18th century and in the 1830s the first phosphorous matches - 'Congreves' - were introduced.

Spunk-fencer. The Slang Dictionary of 1865, it’s a match seller, “spunks” also being the term for lucifer matches. Lucifers...

NOUN: A piece of tinder, sometimes impregnated with sulphur; a match. spunk (n.) ... Sponk: A word used in Edinburgh which denotes a match or anything dipped in sulphur that takes fire.

Tinder, touchwood, as a means of raising fire from a spark (Sc. 1721 Ramsay Poems (S.T.S.) I. Gl.), also in Eng.; later, a sliver of wood dipped in a preparation of sulphur and used for the same purpose (Sc. 1782 J. Sinclair Ob. Sc. Dial. 128; s.Sc. 1802 J. Sibbald Chron. Sc. Poetry Gl.).

by extension: a tiny, poor, miserable fire, also in phr. a spunk of fire, id. (s.Sc. 1802 J. Sibbald Chron. Sc. Poetry Gl.; ne.Sc. 1971). Comb. spunk-hole, a fireplace (Abd. 1921).Ayr. 1786 Burns Ordination xiv.:

We'll light a spunk, and ev'ry skin, We'll rin them aff in fusion.

fig. the least particle or vestige, gen. of some moral quality (I., n.Sc., Per. 1971).Sc. 1702 R. Wodrow Early Letters (S.H.S.) 193:

Its evident hou useful your desing may be to these that have any spunk of love to Christianity.Sc. 1724 Ramsay Poems (S.T.S.) III. 82:

Ilk Creature . . . That had a Spunk of Sence.

spunk n.

[? fig. use of Scot./dial. spunk, a spark]

spunk-faker (n.) [faker n. (5)]

(US) an ostensible match-seller, whose outwardly respectable, if impoverished profession often hides less reputable, and usu. fraudulent, pursuits.




Keith.