Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/379

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CURVED KNIVES, PROBABLY SICKLES.
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to the late Mr. C. Cory, of Yarmouth, who kindly lent it to me for engraving. It has been suggested that it was fixed to a haft, possibly of stag's horn or of wood, but there are no indiciæ of this having been the case, though the side-edges are blunted towards the butt-end, where also remains a considerable portion of the crust of the long nodule of flint from which the instrument was chipped.


Fig. 270.—Eastbourne. 1/2

For the loan of the original of Fig. 270 I am indebted to the late Mr. Caldecott, of Mead Street, near Eastbourne, near which place it was found. It is of grey flint, and presents the peculiarity of having one face partially polished by grinding, which extends to the point, but does not touch the edges, which, as in the other instances, are produced by chipping only. It is rather more convex on the polished face than on the other, and it appears probable that recourse was had to grinding in order to remove a hard projection of the flint which had been too refractory to be chipped off. As usual, there is a portion of the crust of the original flint visible at the butt, where also the side edges have been blunted, in this case by grinding. This instrument has already been described and figured.[1]

A curved knife (73/4 inches) now in the British Museum, much like Fig. 270, was found at Grovehurst,[2] near Milton, Kent.

In the same museum is a beautifully-chipped knife, 81/4 inches long, without any traces of grinding, and of much the same form as this, but with the point more sharply curved. It was found in the Thames, at London, in 1868.

One from Bexley, Kent, is in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford, and another from the Thames at Greenwich in the Jermyn Street Museum.

The Greenwell Collection contains an implement of this class, but of broader proportions, 4 inches long and 13/4 inches wide, with a portion of the natural crust of the flint left on the convex side, not far from the point. It is sharp at the base, which is semicircular, and the edge shows signs of wear. It was found on Heslerton Wold.

A thinner form of curved knife (61/2 inches), found at Balveny,[3] Banffshire, has been figured.

The point of what appears to have been a curved knife of this character was found in the Lake-dwelling of Bodmann.[4] Some curved knives from one at Attersee[5] have been engraved. A long flint knife from Majorca,[6] nearly straight at the edge, but curved at the back, may also be mentioned.

  1. Proc. Soc. Ant., 2nd S., vol. iii. p. 210.
  2. Arch. Cant., vol. xiii. p. 124, xi. Payne's "Coll. Cant.,' 1893, p. 3.
  3. P. S. A. S., vol. xxiii. p. 18.
  4. Keller, 'Pfahlbauten," 6ter Ber., Taf. vii. 32.
  5. "Präh. Atlas," Wien, 1889, Taf. xiii.
  6. Cartailhac, "Mon. prim. des Iles Baléares," 1892, p. 54.