There is a series of minute tools of flint to which special attention |325| has been called by Mr. J. Allen Brown, F.G.S., the Rev. Reginald A. Gatty[1455], and Mr. W. J. Lewis Abbott, F.G.S.[1456] Through the kindness of the last, specimens from a kjökken mödding at Hastings are shown in Figs. 232A, 232B, and 232C. They have been made from small flakes and are of various forms, though I have only selected three for illustration. In two of these the end of the flake has been chipped into a straight scraping edge at an acute angle to the body of the flake, so as to form a tool which can be held in the hand and used for scraping a flat surface, perhaps of bone. Whether the chipping of the edge is intentional or the result of wear, or arising partly from both of these causes, is a question of secondary importance. The oblique ends resemble those of the flakes from Kent’s Cavern, Figs. 398–400, and the _selci romboidale_[1457] of Italian antiquaries. In the other form, one side of a flake has been chipped in a similar manner, so as to form a segment of a circle, or occasionally an obtuse angle; the other side being left intact. This may possibly have been inserted in wood, and the tool thus formed may have been used for scraping or carving. Mr. Abbott disagrees with this view, and thinks that many of the flakes may have been utilized in the formation of fish-hooks. Such tools have been found in Lancashire, far from the sea, and a series from hills in the eastern part of that county has been presented to the British Museum by Dr. Colley March. Owing to their diminutive size they may readily escape observation. Mr. Gatty has found some thousands of these “Pygmy flints” on the surface in the valley of the Don between Sheffield and Doncaster. They no doubt exist in many other districts. [Illustration: Fig. 232A. Fig. 232B. Fig. 232C. 1∕1 Hastings.] [Illustration: Fig. 232D. Fig. 232E. Fig. 232F. 1∕1 Vindhya Hills.] Curiously enough, identical forms have been found in some abundance on the Vindhya Hills[1458] and the Banda district, India; at Helouan,[1459] Egypt, in France, and in the district of the Meuse,[1460] Belgium. Such an identity of form at places geographically so remote does not imply any actual communication between those who made the tools, but merely shows that some of the requirements of daily life, and the means at command for fulfilling them being the same, tools of the same character have been developed, irrespective of time or space. |326| CHAPTER XV. TRIMMED FLAKES, KNIVES, ETC.