Anyone come across one of these before?

I picked this up along a beach recently and think it’s probably used in some sort of boat / ship building. Any ideas what it’s actually for and how the small extra nail in the tip end works?

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square nail so its hand forged takes it back to the 1800s,looks like the small tack is being used as a split pin maybe to keep the trolle.y wheel from falling off

Hi Roy, thanks for that bit of info . I always thought it must be pretty old.

Square copper nails are still available today and used in boat building usually with copper roves (Been there done that)… however the small nail threaded through the eye is a mystery to me…

Keep looking to see how many you can find, heaps would indicate that there was once a boat there which has now rotted away.

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Standard type square copper nail as used onboats - at a guess and entirely a guess I think that the nails put through the end might be placed their to stop the nail withdrawing if the timber of the boat ‘works’ - in other words it is sort of like a split pin.

It would aslo have to be in a place where you could not stand or sit on it so maybe under the thwarts or under the bottom boards (Burden boards?)

Great find though and have never seen a nail through a nail like that.

I just came across this entry.
Have a look at this site.
Pretty interesting as a future reference.
http://www.maritimearchaeology.com/information/reference/fastenings/