From the very beginning of humanity’s use of tools we have needed anvils. From the Neolithic period and the knapping of flint for tool‑making, to the jeweller’s miniature stakes and the colossal industrial hammers weighing many hundreds of tonnes.

On Tuesday 13 August the newly restored hammer was formally inaugurated at Næs Ironworks in Tvedestrand, Norway. Sixty-five years have passed since the dam burst in the 1959 flood, yet the hammer‐blows can again be heard across the valley just as they did for nearly three centuries before.