Abstract: In accordance with the invention, a firewood cleaving apparatus comprises a number of cleaving irons situated in four different consecutive planes, so that a block of wood, which is forced down against the cleaving irons with the aid of a ram, will be stepwise split into twelve billets. The irons in the first two planes split the block in four pieces along radial lines. The iron in the third plane is annular and yields eight pieces; while the irons in the fourth plane are radial but cleave ony the radially outer pieces that were separated from the radially inner pieces by the annular cleaving iron.