Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/140

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118
POLISHED CELTS.
[CHAP. VI.

at Shaw Hall,[1] near Flixton, Lancashire. Another, in the same collection (8 inches), was found near Keswick.


Fig. 61.—Near Pendle, Lancashire. 1/2
What from the engraving would appear to be a large implement of this kind, has been described by Mr. Cuming[2] as a club. "It is wrought of fawn-coloured hone-slate, much like that obtained in the neighbourhood of Snowdon. It weighs 61/4 pounds, and measures 175/8 inches in length, nearly 33/4 inches across its greatest breadth, and nearly 21/8 inches in its greatest thickness. The faces are convex, the edges blunt and thinning off at both of the rounded extremities." It was found near Newton, Lancashire. Another so-called club is mentioned as having been found near Keswick.[3]

Clumsy and unwieldy as implements of such a length appear to be if mounted as axes, there can be no doubt of their having been intended for use as cutting tools; and though, from their size, they might be considered to be clubs, yet their form is but ill-adapted for such a weapon, even if we assume that, as is said to be the case with the New Zealand mere, they were sometimes employed for thrusting as well as for striking, and, therefore, had the broad end sharpened. The Stirlingshire specimen. Fig. 77, which is 131/4 inches long, is, however, sharp at both ends. There have been, moreover, discovered in Denmark what are indubitably celts, longer than the Newton so-called club. They are sometimes more than 18 inches long, and I have myself such an implement from Jutland, of ochreous flint, 16 inches long and 3 inches broad at the edge, which is carefully sharpened. I have another roughly-chipped Danish celt of flint, 141/2 inches long, which weighs 6 lbs. 14 oz., or more than that from Newton.

  1. Arch. Journ., vol. vii. p. 389.
  2. Arch. Assoc. Journ., vol. xv., p. 232.
  3. Proc. Soc. Ant., vol. iii. p. 225.