Spot the Frippet: tin.

 This is easier to spot in Britain, Canada and Australia than in the USA because in those places baked beans come in tins, not cans.

Mind you, a lot of what are called tins aren't actually made of tin - and those that are, have only a very thin coating of tin over a steel structure. But in those cases it's the tin you see.

tin of tea. Photo by Chameleon 

A tinny in Australia and New Zealand is a tin of beer (but this will probably be made of aluminium).

Wriggly tin isn't made of tin, either, being military slang for something most people call corrugated iron (although it's probably made of stainless steel).

photo by Oxyman

A tin whistle is probably made of steel, too.

Anyway, tin is a metal, greyish with a slight yellow tint. If you bend a bar of it, it 'cries' (that is, it makes a soft screaming or crackling noise).

You don't often come across things made of pure tin, but anything made of pewter or bronze (like some coins (tin is slang for money) and large bells) will have some tin in it. So has solder. 

You need tin in the mix to make the pipes of an organ:

organ at Saint-Germain l'Auxerrois, in Paris. Photo by Gérard Janot 

and also to make superconducting magnets. Tin goes into toothpaste and pest killers. You get it in lithium batteries.

Oddly, in the light of tin's association with bells and whistles and pipe organs, someone with a tin ear has dubious taste in music. Someone tin-eared may also be someone who upsets people by saying the wrong thing at the wrong time.

The association with bad sounds goes even further, because something tinny makes an annoying sound lacking in resonance - and it will probably be cheap and badly-made, too.

Spot the Frippet: tin. This word has been around in English since before 1000 AD. Some people think it may go back to the Cornish word stean, Cornwall being the main source of tin in ancient times.