Wiktionary
n. A heartwood of pine trees, impregnated with resin, useful in the manufacture of pitch and pine tar.
Wikipedia
Fatwood, also known as "fat lighter," "lighter wood," "rich lighter," "pine knot," "lighter knot," "heart pine" or "lighter'd", is derived from the heartwood of pine trees. This resin-impregnated heartwood becomes hard and rot-resistant. The stump (and tap root) left in the ground after a tree has fallen or has been cut is an excellent source of fatwood. Other locations, such as the joints where limbs intersect the trunk, can also be harvested. Although most resinous pines can produce fatwood, in the southeastern United States the wood is commonly associated with longleaf pine (Pinus palustris), which historically was highly valued for its high pitch production.
Usage examples of "fatwood".
Flames leaped as if it were a log of fatwood, thundering as they licked up the chimney.
Flames leapt up from the fatwood, catching on the log atop the fire-irons as the women arrayed themselves in the lightly carved low-backed chairs arranged in a semicircle in front of the fireplace.
Bedding, cookware, food, candles, a tin box of lucifer matches and the sandpaper needed to ignite them, a dry bundle of fatwood kindling, a coil of rope, a hand axe, shotgun with powder and shot and wadding, grain for the horse, a mattock and spade.
At either end of the room, stone fireplaces were heaped with fatwood, which popped and crackled with orange flames.
A half-score of white-coated foot flared like fatwood in a winter fire, and the line slowed, but only momentarily, before the Shining Foot surged forward once more, the second line of troops marching over the charred corpses of those who had led the charge.
Meg was bringing Georgia fatwood to light a bonfire, Whit had been given the task of sewing herb sachets to hang on the tree as gifts to the God and Goddess, and Chelsea was going to figure out some kind of maypole.
Benton crouches before the hearth and lights a match, and wisps of smoke curl up from fatwood kindling.