How hand-wrought nails were made from bar iron in the 18th century

The author of a standard reference on nail chronology describes and diagrams the production of nails based on archaeological evidence and 16th- through 18th-century technical references. The description begins with iron bars hot rolled into nail plates which were cut in a slitting mill into nail rods. A blacksmith then forged nails individually from convenient lengths of rod by heating one end, hammering it to a point on the anvil, nicking the rod at proper nail length, reheating it, inserting the point into a heading tool, twisting off the excess rod, and hammering the exposed end to form the head. A diagram illustrates the materials and tools employed in each step.