Minecraft/Anvil

Anvils are versatile and useful, with several uses to players with enough iron to make one.

Obtaining
They also can be found in villages.

Use
They can do three main things:
 * 1) Combine two items of the same type and material together to repair them.
 * 2) Combined a damaged iktem with the mineral used to craft them to repair them. This repairs a quarter of the durability, so you could potentially use more materials than was used to craft it. Sometimes it may be better to just craft a new item, unless it is enchanted or only slightly damaged.
 * 3) Combine two items together to combine its enchantments. This is the most expensive operation, costing the most experience points. Try swapping the two items to see which way is cheeper.

Each of the above costs experience points. On each use, the anvil is slowly damaged, eventually breaking.