dial. and local. [f. KNAP v.1 + -ER1.] One who or that which ‘knaps’; one who knaps or breaks stones, flints, or the like; esp. one whose occupation is the shaping of flints by strokes of a hammer.
1870. Spectator, 13 Aug., 976. They [flints] then pass into the hands of the ‘knapper.’ His implements are a small anvil, called a ‘stake,’ set obliquely … and a ‘knapping-hammer’ of fine steel, of which the face is set obliquely also…. One smart blow strikes off the rough end, another detaches a piece of the proper size for a gun-flint.
1894. Athenæum, 27 Jan., 111/1. ‘Knapping’ flints, as practised on Brandon Heath, in Suffolk, is exceedingly hard work, though there the ‘knapper’ labours for ‘his own hand.’
b. A hammer used for shaping flints; also, Sc. a stone-breaker’s hammer; a knapping-hammer.
1787. Shirref, Jamie & Bess, IV. i. A finer lad … ne’er cocked his knapper to the lift.
1882. Athenæum, 16 Dec., 818/1. Palæolithic implements,… together with the flint tools, or knappers, by which they were shaped. Ibid., 818/2. Neolithic knappers were shown,… with knapping hammers of the seventeenth or eighteenth century.
