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CHAPTER VII.
PICKS, CHISELS, GOUGES, ETC.
I now come to several forms of implements which, though approximating closely to those to which the name of celts has been applied, may perhaps be regarded with some degree of certainty as forming a separate class of tools. Among these, the long narrow form to which, for want of a better name, that of "Picks" has been given, may be first described. It is, however, hard to draw a line between them and chisels.
Fig. 107.—Great Easton.
An idea of the prevailing form will be gathered from Fig. 107, which represents a specimen in my own collection found at Great Easton, near Dunmow, Essex, and given me by Colonel A. J. Copeland, F.S.A. Its surfaces are partially ground, especially towards the upper end, which appears to have been pointed, though now somewhat broken. The lower end is chipped to a rounded outline, but this end is not ground, and the outer or more convex face of the implement, in one part shows the original crust of the flint.
In the Fitch Collection is a finer and more symmetrical specimen of the same kind from North Walsham. It is 712 inches long, rather more than 1 inch wide, and 78 inch thick. It is polished nearly all over, both faces are ridged, so that it is almost rhomboidal in section, though the angles are rounded; one face is curved lengthways much more than the other, which is nearly straight. At one end it is ground to a semicircular edge, but at the other it is merely chipped, and still shows part of the original crust of the flint. Another implement of this character, but 1112 inches long, and 278 inches wide in the broadest part, was found at Melbourn,[1] Cambridgeshire, and was in the collection of the late Lord Braybrooke.
- ↑ Arch. Journ., vol. xvii. p. 170.
