Glossary G: Gauge (Marking) Annex
under
construction 6-28-07 --
obviously more work is needed, because as it
sits, this entry is a little more dependent upon
authorities than I prefer.
Gauge:
The most common gauge, often
called
the "marking gauge", marks (or, more correctly,
"scribes") a line parallel to the edge of a
workpiece. Commercial marking gauges --
usually of beech-wood -- consist of two parts, a
fence about 27 x 2 in and a stem about 9–10 in
long, sometimes graduated, and carrying a
pointed steel spur at one end. The head is fixed
in any required position by means of a wood
thumbscrew or by wedge.
The term "gauge", itself -- used
as both noun and verb, and pronounced "gaj" --
dates to 1440, in
Promptorium Parvulorum, the
first English-Latin dictionary. (See page 424
of The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology,
1988). As verb, "to gauge" means to
measure accurately. As a noun, if we
follow Barnhart, the term itself
is "borrowed through Anglo-French gauge, from
Old North French gauger, from gauge, or
gauging rod, perhaps from Gallo-Romance
galga, collective plural of Frankish galgo...."
As spelling variants, examples
of both "gauge" and "gage" exist from Middle
English, "though in American English, "gage is
used exclusively in some technical uses and
especially in technical uses of the verb"
Barnhart, page 424
Very ancient tools, marking gauges are of two
types: Some marking gauges have sixteenth-inch
graduations along the beam, while others are
unmarked and require setting with a rule. The
"unmarked" type is shown in the jpg on the left.
On the right is a crude drawing of a person
using a gauge to mark a line parallel to an
edge. Below, in the box for Shelley, is an image
from Chelsea Fraser, The Boy's Busy Book
New York: Thomas Y Crowell, 1927, page 48.
Tradesmen and apprentices often made
their own.... Marking Gauges which
may still be seen in the work-shops
in a great variety of patterns, some
of which are both ingenious and
beautiful. The home-made method of
fixing the fence is almost
invariably by captive wedge....
Source: R A Salman,
Dictionary of Woodworking
tools c 1700-1970, and tools of
allied trades 2d ed.
London: Allen and Unwin,
1989. pages 201-202
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The following are references in
the online Oxford English Dictionary
(subscription):
Of the Gage..Its
Office is to Gage a Line parallel to
any straight side.
Source: 1678
J. Moxon, Mechanick Exercises.
London, 1683 I. 90
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Gage, in
joinery..is made of an oval piece of
wood, fitted upon a square stick, to
slide up and down stifly thereon
[etc.].
source:
1751
Ephraim Chambers Cyclopaedia,
London. [First published 1738.]
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The gauge is an
instrument used for drawing or
making a line on a piece of stuff to
a width parallel to the edge.
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From this flat
surface the desired thickness must
be set off at each end with a
marking gauge .... the scratch which
it leaves indicating the amount to
be planed off the opposite side.
Source:
Shelley, C. P. B. (Charles Percy
Bysshe),
Workshop appliances including
descriptions of the gauging and
measuring instruments, the hand
cutting-tools, lathes, drilling,
planning, and other machine-tools
used by engineers. by C.
P. B. Shelley New York,: D. Appleton
& co., 1873, pages 122-123
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The following account is adapted from
Goodman, 1966, and Salaman, 1989:
No evidence suggests that the
Egyptians, the Greeks or the Romans used
this tool. Our first known record of its use
comes from an engraving c. 1600 by the
engraver, Hieronymus Wierix: Holy Family.
(At this time -- 6-1-07 -- no evidence
exists that this image in on the internet.)
There was apparently no method of fixing the
adjustable fence (Goodman, 1966, page 201;
Salaman, 1989, page 202).
Later,
long, narrow wedges are used to secure the
fence, as Denis Diderot, in his
Encyclopédie,1763,
illustrates. As Salaman points out, these
wedges pass "vertically through the depth of
the head, a method which is still used in
modern French Gauges". The earliest known
use of the thumbscrew -- the current
standard for factory-made gauges -- is in
Joseph Smith, Explanation or key, to
the various manufactories of Sheffield, with
engravings of each article South
Burlington, Vt. : Early American Industries
Association, 1816.This became the standard
method for most commercially made English
Marking Gauges.
Early
eighteenth-century Marking Gauges do not
always have a spur. Instead the workman held
a spike or pencil against the end of the
stem, as is done today with a Thumb Gauge.
Source:
R A Salman,
Dictionary of Woodworking tools c
1700-1970, and tools of allied trades
2d ed. London: Allen and
Unwin, 1989. pages 201-202
The 15th-century poem
"The Debate of the Carpenter's Tools"
(Hazlitt, Early Popular Poetry,
Vol. 1, pp. 79–90) mentions a
'skantyllyon', which may have been some kind
of gauge, but no examples of the tool occur
in the medieval pictures. Felibien
[A. Felbien, Principes de
l'Architecture, 1676, has two
gauges, the ordinary marking gauge and one
with an extra long point, probably a cutting
gauge. Neither of these tools show any
fixing for the fence, and the printer,
J. Moxon, Mechanick
Exercises. 1683, states that "the
Oval, as he calls the block, is 'fitted
stiff upon the staff'." Peter Nicholson,
Mechanical Exercises, 1812,
shows a perfectly plain gauge similar to
this, with no provision for securing the
block, but Diderot, in his
Encyclopédie,
"trusquin" (French for marking gauge)
has a thin, narrow wedge, while
Bergeron's of 1816 has a small screw.
Nicholson in his text mentions that
separate gauges must be set when marking
mortise and tenon joints, but on the
Continent over a century earlier, a "double
gauge" was in common use.
Marking Gauge
included in this
inlaid panel on
Danish tool chest,
1679, Dansk
Folkmuseum,
Copenhagen.
Source: W L
Goodman, The
History of
Woodworking Tools,
London: Bell, 1966,
page 201
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Sources: A. Felbien,
Principes de l'Architecture, etc.
Paris, 1676; J. Moxon, Mechanick
Exercises. London, 1683;
Denis Diderot,
Encyclopédie.
Paris, 1765 [online but subscription needed];
P Nicholson, Mechanical Exercises.
London, 1812; Joseph Smith,
Explanation or key, to the various manufactories
of Sheffield, with engravings of each article,
South Burlington, Vt. : Early American
Industries Association, 1975, 1816; Shelley, C.
P. B. (Charles Percy Bysshe), 1827-1890,
Workshop appliances including descriptions
of the gauging and measuring instruments, the
hand cutting-tools, lathes, drilling, planning,
and other machine-tools used by engineers.
by C. P. B. Shelley New York,: D. Appleton &
co., 1873. (Making of America Books); Chelsea
Fraser, The Boy's Busy Book New York: Thomas Y Croweel, 1927; Ediwn G Hamilton, Home
Carpentry New York: Dodd Mead, 1941,
pages 18-19; W L Goodman, The History of
Woodworking Tools, London: Bell, 1966;
Robert K Barnhart, ed., The Barnhart
Dictionary of Etymology New York: H W
Wilson, 1988
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