vbl. sb. [f. TIN v. or sb. + -ING1.] I. The action of the verb TIN.
1. Coating, lining, or plating with tin; working at tin-ware.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 494/2. Tynnynge wythe tynne, stannacio.
1487–8. Rec. St. Mary at Hill, 130. Paide to Westwode, smyth,… for tynnyng of the same boltes.
1537. Acc. Ld. High Treas. Scot., VI. 337. Item, for grathing and dichting and tynnyng of ten tua handit suerdis.
1611. Cotgr., Plombement, a leading, or tinning.
1789. Trans. Soc. Arts, I. 13. Tinning with pure Tin.
1800. trans. Lagrange’s Chem., II. 107. The tinning of copper consists in applying a coating of tin to the surface of that metal.
1851. Mayhew, Lond. Labour (1864), I. 302/1. As you see, sir, I work at tinning. I put new bottoms into old tin tea-pots, and such like.
1873. E. Spon, Workshop Receipts, Ser. I. 9/1. When the article is prepared for tinning, it may be immersed in the tinning metal.
b. concr. A tin coating or lining.
1761. Chron., in Ann. Reg., 143/1. This accident was … occasioned by using a copper sauce pan, from which the tinning was worn off.
1839. Ure, Dict. Arts, s.v. Alloy, Tinning, gilding, and silvering may also be reckoned a species of alloys.
2. The putting up and sealing of meat, fish, fruit, etc., in tins for preservation; canning.
1903. Daily Chron., 13 Jan., 6/1. The tinning of sprats from Honfleur and other points.
II. 3. Tin-mining.
1855. J. R. Leifchild, Cornwall Mines, 197. For a long period in the early history of tin-mining, the mines of Cornwall appear to have been in the hands of the Jews…. When the Jews were hotly persecuted, those engaged in ‘tinning’ were particularly exempted.
III. 4. attrib.
1860. Tomlinson, Arts & Manuf., Ser. II. Pins, 47. Then comes the whitening, or tinning process.
1868. Joynson, Metals, 104. The plates are now received one by one from the tinning bath.
1898. Daily News, 11 Aug., 7/2. Tinning factories have more than they want.
1909. Eng. Rev., March, 621. [They] put them into patent tinning-pots.
