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
I am uncertain whether the instruments shown in Figs. 231 and 232
|324| can be with propriety classed among boring tools, as it is
possible that they may have been intended and used for some totally
different purpose, such, for instance, as forming the tips of arrows,
for which, from their symmetrical form, they are not ill adapted.
Though the points of those, like Fig. 231, are much rounded, it
may be that they were mounted like the chisel-edged Egyptian flint
arrow-heads, of which hereafter. A number of instruments of this form
have been found in Derbyshire and Suffolk, but that here figured came
from the Yorkshire Wolds, and has been made from a part of a thin flat
flake, one edge of which forms the base opposite to the semicircular
point. The side edges, which expand with a sweep to the base, are
carefully chipped to a sharp angle with the face of the flake; but in
some instances this secondary working extends over a greater or less
portion of both faces. Some specimens are also much longer in their
proportions. The original edge of the flake, which extends along the
base, is usually unworn by use, so that if these objects were boring
tools this part may have been protected by being inserted in a notch in
a piece of wood, which in such a case would serve as a handle for using
the tool after the manner of an auger. A few examples of this kind have
been found on the Culbin Sands[1453], Elginshire. The same form has
been found in the Camp de Chassey[1454] (Saône et Loire).
[Illustration: Fig. 231.—Yorkshire Wolds. 1∕1]
[Illustration: Fig. 232.—Yorkshire Wolds. 1∕1]
Fig. 232 is also from the Yorkshire Wolds. Though more acutely pointed
than Fig. 231, it seems to have been intended for much the same
purpose, and it has been formed in a similar manner. The secondary
working is principally on the convex face of the flake, but owing to
an irregularity in the surface of the flat face, a portion of it has
been removed by secondary chipping along one edge, so as to bring it as
nearly as possible in the same plane as the other. For whatever purpose
this instrument may have been designed, its symmetry is remarkable.
I have a somewhat similar instrument from Bridlington, but triangular
in form, with the sides curved slightly inwards, and the two most
highly wrought edges produced by chipping almost equally on both faces
of the flake. Such a form approximates most closely to some of those
which there appears reason for regarding as triangular arrow-heads.
In America, some forms which might be taken for arrow-heads have been
regarded as drills.
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