The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons and Ornaments, of Great Britain: Second Edition, RevisedEvans, John
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The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons and Ornaments, of Great Britain: Second Edition, Revised
Evans, John
Great Britain -- Antiquities; Stone age -- Great Britain
Such a method of hafting cannot, I think, have been in general use in
this country, for want of the necessary cementing material, though,
from discoveries made in Scandinavia, it would appear that a resinous
pitch was in common use for fixing bronze implements to their handles;
so that the practice may also have applied to those of stone. In the
Swiss Lake-dwellings, bitumen was used as a cement for attaching stone
to wood. In the case of the axes of the Indians on the River Napo,[601]
Ecuador, the binding of |171| the blades, which are formed with
lugs like those of Guiana, is covered with a thick coating formed of
bees-wax and mastic.
Besides those that were hafted as axes or adzes, it seems probable that
not a few of the implements known as celts may have been for use in the
hand as cutting tools, either mounted in short handles or unmounted.
There can be but little doubt that the tools, Fig. 83 and 83A, were
thus used in the hand, as also the implement with a depression on each
face (Fig. 87), and that with the notches at the side (Fig. 89); and
they can hardly have been unique of their kind.
Dr. Lukis,[602] indeed, at one time expressed an opinion that the stone
celt was not intended to be secured “in a handle, but was held in the
hand and applied to particular uses which are not now evident, but to
which neither the hammer nor the hatchet were applicable.” But in the
face of the fact that numerous handles have since been found, such an
opinion is no longer tenable except in a very limited sense.
Among modern savages we have instances of similar tools being used
in the hand without the intervention of any haft, giving a form much
like that of Fig. 83A, though among the Australians the butt-end is
sometimes enveloped in a mass of resinous matter, so as to form a knob
which fits the hand. According to Prinz Neuwied,[603] the Botocudos
used their stone blades both unmounted in the hand and hafted as
hatchets. The South Australians[604] and Tasmanians[605] likewise use
celts in a similar manner.
There are cases in which the hatchet and haft have been formed from
one piece of stone. Such a one, of chloritic stone, found in a mound
in Tennessee,[606] is in outline like Fig. 92, and has a small loop
for suspension at the end of the handle. Mr. Cursiter, of Kirkwall,
has an instrument of the same kind from Orkney, formed of hard slate.
In extreme length it measures 9 3∕4 inches. It cannot, however, be
assigned to a very early date. For a comparison of celts from different
countries Westropp’s “Prehistoric Phases”[607] may be consulted.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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