[Evidenced only since 16th c.; identical with MDu. and Du. klamp ‘heap,’ and possibly an adoption of that word as a term of brickmakers. It may be originally from the same root as CLAMP sb.1, with the notion of a closely compressed mass; see also CLUMP.]
A compact heap, mound or pile of materials; in various specific senses.
1. Brick-making. A large quadrangular stack or pile of bricks built for burning in the open air.
1596–7. S. Fische, in Ducarel, Hist. Croydon (1783), App. 153. To the Parke we came, and there wente from clampe to clampe.
1679. Plot, Staffordsh. (1686), 128. For burning a Clamp of 16000 bricks, they use about 7 Tunns of coal.
1745. De Foe’s Eng. Tradesm. (1841), I. iii. 22. A person goes into a brickmaker’s field to view his clamp, and buy a load of bricks.
1844. Alb. Smith, Adv. Mr. Ledbury, xxxvii. (1886), 115. Where … some contiguous brick clamp dispelled the gloom.
2. Farming. a. A mound of earth or turf lined with straw, in which potatoes, etc., are kept during winter; b. a stack of turf or peat; c. a manure-heap; d. a heap of farm or garden rubbish for burning, etc.
1724. Swift, Wks. (1854), II. 79/1. Not a bit of turf in this cold weather; and Mrs. Johnson and the dean … forced to assist at the Bog, in gathering up the wet bottoms of old clamps.
1744–50. W. Ellis, Mod. Husbandm., VI. i. 91. A square clamp or dunghil.
1753. Henry, Stream Wind, in Phil. Trans., XLVIII. 2. Several clamps of turf … standing in a bog.
1771. Projects, in Ann. Reg., 108/1. Men … pile up the dung in a square clamp.
1834. Brit. Husb., I. xvi. 352. When the inclosure was filled with sods, and the clamp raised to the height of eight feet, twelve fires were all kindled at the same time, and, in less than forty-eight hours, the whole mass, containing 400 cart-loads, was entirely burnt through to the top.
1881. Daily News, 4 June, 5/5. The clamps of mangolds were being eaten into with alarming rapidity.
3. Mining, etc.: A pile of limestone or metal ore for roasting, a heap of coal for coking, etc.
1877. E. Peacock, N. W. Linc. Gloss. (E. D. S.), Clamp, a pile of bricks or limestone for burning.
4. Comb., as clamp-burnt adj., clamp-brick, -kiln.
1795. Erskine, Agric. Surv. Clackm., 311 (Jam.). When the uncalcined lime-stone is imported, the farmers burn it in what is called clamp-kilns, which are built round or oblong with sods and earth.
1836. Penny Cycl., V. 408/2. Clamp-bricks … kiln-burnt bricks and marl stocks, as well as Dutch clinkers.
1881. Mechanic, § 1152. 539. Clamp-burnt bricks.
