The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons and Ornaments, of Great Britain: Second Edition, RevisedEvans, John
History
The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons and Ornaments, of Great Britain: Second Edition, Revised
Evans, John
Great Britain -- Antiquities; Stone age -- Great Britain
Another axe-hammer of greenstone, with projections on the faces
opposite the centre of the hole, and with a hollow fluting near each
margin, that is carried round on the sides below the holes, is shown
in Fig. 139. The original was found by the Rev. J. C. Atkinson, who
kindly lent it me for engraving. It lay in an urn about 17 inches high,
containing burnt bones and some fragments of burnt flint, in a large
barrow on the Skelton Moors, Yorkshire. In the same barrow were found
eight other urns, all containing secondary interments. In another
barrow, on Westerdale Moors, Mr. Atkinson found a second axe-hammer of
nearly the same size and form, but more hammer-like at the end. This
also has the channels on the faces. It is of fine-grained granite,
and lay in an urn with burnt bones, a small “incense-cup,” and a sort
of long bone bead, having a spiral pattern upon it and a transverse
orifice into the perforation, about the centre. In this case, also, the
interment was not that over which the barrow was originally raised.
In another barrow, on Danby North Moors, also opened by Mr. Atkinson,
a rather larger axe-hammer of much the same outline, lay with the
hole in a vertical position, about 15 inches above a deposit of burnt
bones. It is of basalt much decayed. An axe-hammer from Inveraray,[755]
Argyllshire (5 3∕4 inches), in outline rather like Fig. 143, has small
projections on each face opposite to the centre of the shaft-hole.
[Illustration: Fig. 139.—Skelton Moors. 1∕2]
[Illustration: Fig. 140.—Selwood Barrow. 1∕2]
A longer and more slender form has also occasionally been found in
tumuli. Sir R. Colt Hoare has given an engraving of a beautiful
specimen from the Selwood Barrow,[756] near Stourton, which is here
reproduced as Fig. 140. The axe is of syenite, 5 1∕2 inches long,
and lay in a cist, in company with burnt bones and a small bronze
dagger, which in the description is erroneously termed a lance-head.
Parallel with each side, there appears to be a small groove worked
on the face of the weapon. A very pretty example of the same form
|212| accompanied an interment in a barrow at Snowshill,[757]
Gloucestershire. With it were associated two bronze daggers and a
bronze pin.
In the Christy Collection is a similar but larger specimen, 7 inches
long, formed of dark greenstone. It also has the grooves along the
margin of the faces, and has an oval flat face about 1 inch by 7∕8 inch
at the hammer-end. The hole, which is 1 1∕8 inch full in diameter at
one side, contracts rather suddenly to 1 inch at the other. This weapon
was formerly in the Leverian Museum, and is said to have been found
in a barrow near Stonehenge, which, from its similarity to Sir R. C.
Hoare’s specimen, there seems no reason to doubt.
[Illustration: Fig. 140A.—Longniddry. 1∕2]
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