The article talks about what tinder is, a test word is given for it and explains why it is used and what types it happens.
Fire
Fire has been a persistent companion of man for many millennia. In ancient times, it gave people the opportunity to warm themselves in the cold winter, to protect themselves from wild animals, to cook soft foods that old people and children could eat, to give a distress signal and, finally, to light the room.
It is difficult to say exactly when our ancestors first started using fire and getting it on their own and how many situations there were when this knowledge and skill was lost. If we talk about the method that then existed for many centuries, then its origin is probably as follows: when processing stone tools, someone noticed sparks flying away from the workpiece and decided to try to start a fire with their help, and not by rubbing a tree against a tree, which is unusually long and laborious process.
Later, this method underwent changes, and instead of one of the stones, people began to use a strip of iron with notches, and the material for ignition was replaced by a special pre-prepared tinder. That is how the flint appeared. But what is tinder, how does it happen and how is it made? We’ll talk about this.
Definition
A tinder is a material that is used to make fire with a flint. As a rule, it is very flammable or begins to smolder even from minor sparks. Rags, fluffy cotton wool, dried spruce cones, paper, grated with wax or impregnated with vapors of combustible substances, and much more can act as a tinder. But if we analyze the meaning of the word "tinder", then its name comes from the fungus-tinder fungus, which grows almost throughout the territory of Russia and part of Europe and has been used since ancient times as a material for the production of fire. Over time, the word "tinder" has become a household word and is used to denote any substances that are used in conjunction with a flint.
Now consider the process of making tinder from a mushroom and some other materials.
Manufacture
The second most popular material for the manufacture of tinder was a burnt cotton fabric. To give the desired properties, it was “baked” in the fire, placed in a fireproof container, for example, in an earthenware bowl or a tin can. After that, such a tinder was very easily ignited by even inconspicuous sparks. So now we know what tinder is.
But still, initially and historically, the tinder was made from a fungus-tinder fungus. For this, it is necessary to cut its spongy, porous part into thin slices. Then they were mixed with wood ash, poured with water and cooked over low heat for several hours. After cooking, the broth itself was poured off, and the resulting substance was kneaded, beaten to a pancake-like state and dried. After all these procedures, such a tinder could easily be ignited with sparks, and then the smoldering flame could be inflated and any other material set on fire. Now we know exactly what the word "tinder" means.
Flint
As already mentioned, various materials of natural origin could play the role of tinder, but since the extraction of fire with the help of a flint required dexterity, our ancestors preferred to prepare the tinder in advance and from such materials that were ignited most simply and easily. After all, sometimes it was necessary to make a fire under a strong wind or in wet weather. With what tinder, we figured out, now consider the details of the flint itself.
- Chair . Usually it is a strip of durable metal, the surface of which is covered with small notches in the manner of a file. This is done to facilitate the production of sparks. When they hit the surface of the flint, the smallest particles break off from the latter, which ignite in air and have a temperature of about 900-1000 degrees Celsius. And, falling onto the tinder, these particles cause it to ignite or smolder.
- Flint . Since ancient times, a piece of iron sulfide, pyrite, has been used as this subject. It was selected taking into account the convenience of retention, the absence of cracks (pyrite is very fragile) and the absence of large pores, since it will constantly get wet because of them. It is not known exactly when exactly our ancestors began to use iron sulfide. According to one version, miners of the early Middle Ages noticed that a significant amount of bright and hot sparks formed as a result of the Kyle impact on this mineral, and this property of pyrite was then used in the fire mining mechanism.
- Tinder . What is it, we have already figured out. But in the absence of previously prepared special combustible material, dry grass, wool, cotton wool, moss, bird fluff and everything that could ignite from sparks could be used as such.
Tinder. Verification Word
If we talk about etymology, then in this case the test word is “tinder fungus” or “tinder fungus” - a type of mushroom, from which this combustible material for flint was historically made.
Modern flint
Despite the fact that in our time the production of fire has long ceased to be a problem, hunters, tourists, fishermen and residents of especially remote taiga villages continue to use the flint. But the chair and flint of the modern flint are made of special metal alloys that give whole sheaves of hot sparks, and you can easily burn even large birch bark with them.