The hammer and pick is a symbol representing the industrialised working class

Working class

Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...

es, similar to the more famous hammer and sickle

Hammer and sickle

The hammer and sickle is a part of communist symbolism and its usage indicates an association with Communism, a Communist party, or a Communist state. It features a hammer and a sickle overlapping each other. The two tools are symbols of the industrial proletariat and the peasantry; placing them...

. It was used in the flag of the Marxist People's Republic of Congo between 1970 and 1991.

It can also indicate mining

Mining

Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the earth, from an ore body, vein or seam. The term also includes the removal of soil. Materials recovered by mining include base metals, precious metals, iron, uranium, coal, diamonds, limestone, oil shale, rock...

, mines (especially on maps), or miners, and is also borne as a charge

Charge (heraldry)

In heraldry, a charge is any emblem or device occupying the field of an escutcheon . This may be a geometric design or a symbolic representation of a person, animal, plant, object or other device...

 in the coats of arms

Coat of arms

A coat of arms is a unique heraldic design on a shield or escutcheon or on a surcoat or tabard used to cover and protect armour and to identify the wearer. Thus the term is often stated as "coat-armour", because it was anciently displayed on the front of a coat of cloth...

 of mining town

Mining town

A mining community, also known as a mining town or a mining camp, is a community that houses miners. Mining communities are usually created around a mine or a quarry for the extraction or smeltering of ore.-United States:...

s. There the symbol represents the traditional tools of the miner

Miner

A miner is a person whose work or business is to extract ore or minerals from the earth. Mining is one of the most dangerous trades in the world. In some countries miners lack social guarantees and in case of injury may be left to cope without assistance....

, a hammer

Hammer

A hammer is a tool meant to deliver an impact to an object. The most common uses are for driving nails, fitting parts, forging metal and breaking up objects. Hammers are often designed for a specific purpose, and vary widely in their shape and structure. The usual features are a handle and a head,...

 and a chisel

Chisel

A chisel is a tool with a characteristically shaped cutting edge of blade on its end, for carving or cutting a hard material such as wood, stone, or metal. The handle and blade of some types of chisel are made of metal or wood with a sharp edge in it.In use, the chisel is forced into the material...

 on a handle, similar to a pickaxe

Pickaxe

A pickaxe or pick is a hand tool with a hard head attached perpendicular to the handle.Some people make the distinction that a pickaxe has a head with a pointed end and a flat end, and a pick has both ends pointed, or only one end; but most people use the words to mean the same thing.The head is...

, but with one blunt end. They are pictured in the way a right-handed worker would lay them down: the pick with the point to the right and the handle to the lower left, the hammer with the handle to the lower right and the head to the upper left. The handle of the pick protrudes over the head, because the head is not permanently fixed, but can be swapped for a newly sharpened head when it is blunt from use. In coats of arms the symbol is often shown in black (Johanngeorgenstadt

Johanngeorgenstadt

Johanngeorgenstadt is a mining town in Saxony’s Ore Mountains, 17 km south of Aue, and 27 km northwest of Karlovy Vary. It lies in the district of Erzgebirgskreis, and right on the border with the Czech Republic, is a state-recognized health resort , and calls itself Stadt des...

, Hövels

Hövels

Hövels is a municipality in the district of Altenkirchen, in Rhineland-Palatinate, in western Germany....

), but also in natural colours (Telnice) or in gold and/or silver (Abertamy

Abertamy

Abertamy is a town in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It is located in Ore Mountains about north of Karlovy Vary and has a population of 1,413...

, Bodenwöhr

Bodenwöhr

Bodenwöhr is a municipality in the district of Schwandorf in Bavaria, Germany....

, Gelsenkirchen

Gelsenkirchen

Gelsenkirchen is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northern part of the Ruhr area. Its population in 2006 was c. 267,000....

).

Furthermore it is used to indicate

• the working day, on timetables
  Schedule (workplace)
  A schedule, often called a rota, is a list of employees who are working on any given day, week, or month in a workplace. A schedule is necessary for the day-to-day operation of any retail store or manufacturing facility. The process of creating a schedule is called scheduling...
  
  

Unicode

In Unicode

Unicode

Unicode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems...

, the "hammer and pick" symbol is U+2692 .

See also

• Other variations of the hammer and sickle symbol