Blacksmith

How to spell blacksmith

10 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce blacksmith

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does blacksmith mean?

1. nounA craftsman who forges and shapes iron and other metals by heating them and hammering them on an anvil.

Blacksmith in a sentence

• The village blacksmith shoed the horses every spring.

• A skilled blacksmith can hammer a glowing iron bar into a gate hinge.

Where does blacksmith come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a native English compound that joins 'black' with 'smith'. The word 'smith' goes back to the Old English smið, meaning a worker in metal or a skilled craftsman, and it has relatives across the Germanic languages such as the German Schmied. The 'black' part distinguishes this craftsman from a 'whitesmith', who worked in lighter-coloured metals such as tin; a blacksmith worked the 'black' metals, chiefly iron, which oxidises to a dark surface during forging. The combined form is recorded from around the fifteenth century, describing exactly the trade we still picture today: heating iron in a forge and shaping it on an anvil. The surname Smith, one of the most common in the English-speaking world, grew directly out of this same ancient occupational root, which is why the spelling stays so familiar.

How the word is built

• black (the dark colour of iron)
• smith (one who works metal, from Old English smið 'craftsman')