Tamp
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A tamper is a device used to compact or flatten an aggregate, typically to make it resistant to further compression. Some examples are small, handheld tampers to compress ground coffee into a puck in the preparation of espresso, manual or powered tampers to compact gravel in the preparation of laying a concrete or brick patio or walkway so that the underlying gravel layer does not settle over time, and self-propelled, mechanised ballast tampers, which compact the ballast underneath rail tracks.
Railroad construction foreman Phineas Gage lived for almost twelve years after an 1848 accident which drove a three-foot seven-inch iron tamper ("tamping iron") through his brain.
