Journal of the Straits Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society/Volume 23/Discovery of a Stone Implement in Singapore
OCCASIONAL NOTES.
DISCOVERY OF A STONE IMPLEMENT IN SINGAPORE.
A short time ago, Lieutenant A. D. Cox, while walking on a road at the barracks at Tanglin, picked up from among the laterite which was being put on the road a large stone implement, which he has presented to the Museum. The weapon is five inches in length and nearly four inches across and about one and a half thick in the thickest part. It is oblong, with one end abruptly truncate, the other ground off to a rounded cutting edge. It is a good deal worn, and at one spot bears a small coral, showing that it had recently come from the sea. It is of a dark chocolate-brown externally, but by dipping it a little at one corner it was found to be composed of a very hard compact granite containing very small flakes of mica. On enquiry I found that the contractor who was laying down the laterite had obtained it from Tanjong Karang on the West Coast of Singapore. This spot I have since visited, and found that the stone was being taken from below high water mark, which would account for the presence of the coral upon the specimen. Tanjong Karang is a small promontory, consisting of a core of rather hard iron-stone, covered with about two feet of humus and gravelly soil. There is what is called a Kramat at the corner nearest to the spot whence the specimen must have come, but this Kramat merely consists of a detached block of iron-stone, which in shape more or less resembles a tomb. The overlying soil on the promontory has so shifted from denudation that it is impossible to get any idea of its age; fragments of modern pottery occurring even at the part where it rests on the iron-stone. I sought carefully for any more weapons, but could find none, and indeed it was hardly to be expected, as they are almost always found singly here.
Hitherto, as far as I am aware, no worked stone of this class has ever been found in Singapore, though stone implements have been obtained in some numbers in Perak and Pahang, where they are known as Batu Linta. These latter are generally made of a black igneous rock, and of a narrower form than the present one. The form, however, of a stone are must always depend on the texture and hardness of the stone and its cleavage. And the exceedingly hard texture of this granite is, no doubt, the reason for its broad shape. The edge has evidently been ground very carefully, but not equally, one side being flatter than the other. From this I gather that the weapon was used as an adze or biliong.
Of what race were the makers of these weapons we are entirely ignorant, none of the wild tribes use stone weapons, nor do they know anything about those that are found in the Peninsula. Nor is the stone of which the Pahang specimens are made, known at all from this region. It is probable that these were brought from farther East, but the Singapore specimen is made of granite, and of such granite as is found at no great distance from Tanjong Karang, namely, at Pulau Ubin, and I also found an outcrop of granite in one of the hills between Tanjong Karang and Toas. It is probable, therefore, that it was made on or near the spot where it was found, possibly from a sea-shore pebble of granite from the neighbourhood of Pulau Ubin.