“On tenterhooks” is recorded by the mid-18th century; an early known example appears in Samuel Richardson’s 1748 novel *Clarissa*. That date marks evidence of the expression in print, not necessarily the moment someone first coined it. Its image comes from a much older part of textile work: the tenter, a frame used to hold cloth while it dried.
After cloth was washed or otherwise finished, workers stretched it across a tenter and secured its edges on rows of small hooks. Keeping the fabric taut helped it dry to the desired shape and size rather than shrink or become distorted. The hooks held the material under tension, making the process an apt source for a metaphor about feeling strained and unable to relax.
The expression’s sense shifted from a physical arrangement to a state of mind. To be “on tenterhooks” came to mean waiting in nervous suspense, as if one were stretched tight while an outcome remained uncertain. The phrase does not describe a documented method of torture: although its hooks may conjure a grisly scene, its established association is with cloth-making. Nor does the first surviving printed example prove that the wording originated in Richardson’s time; it may have been in speech earlier.
Today, the phrase fits the tense pause before news, a decision, or a result. “We were on tenterhooks until the doctor called with the test results.” “The final episode left viewers on tenterhooks about who would make it home.”
The image endures because it makes suspense feel physical: you are stretched tight, waiting for the strain to let go.