Cannons in the Canon 7: The Tempest and Mill-Wheels Strike

There is a curious line in the Tempest:

And left thee there: where thou didst vent thy groanes
As fast as Mill-wheeles strike: Then was this Island

If you do a search on EEBO, there are many Mill-Wheel metaphors, but they are different; they deal with the turning of the wheel. For instance:

1584  thyne imagination goeth alwayes aboute lyke the wheele of a mill, and if thou doest put into it good thoughtes, it will yelde thee meale agayne of good workes:

1593 doth grinde the mill, the Wheele turnes round, and neuer standeth still: long is the toyle

1607 by reason of the continuall motion which the wheeles of the mill made, he was taken vp and saued

1610 the couetous or most wealthiest man, is but as the mill-wheele, which though it turne all day about, yet at night is found where it vvas in the morning

1614 Carnall men make their praiers as the water mooues the mill-wheele; when the water ceaseth, the wheele staieth

So why is Shakespeare talking about a mill-wheel striking something, making a noise?

If you follow this blog carefully, you know the answer. From the mid 1580s to the mid 1590s Henry Neville owned and operated an ironworks in Sussex in Mayfield. He cast iron ordnance. Metaphors from that experience are found throughout the Shakespeare canon.

The blast furnaces of that time used giant bellows run by a water wheel. But the water wheel did double-duty. It also drove hammers that pounded on the iron. You can read more in this blog post.

Better yet here is a video of what he is talking about (skip to about a minute in):

Here are two more examples of the same metaphor:

Vengeance is in my heart, death in my hand,
Blood and revenge are hammering in my head.
Titus Andronicus, 2.3

To dry the old oak's sap and cherish springs,
To spoil antiquities of hammer'd steel,
And turn the giddy round of Fortune's wheel;
Rape of Lucrece

Needs must I under my transgression bow,
Unless my nerves were brass or hammer'd steel.
Sonnet 120