8o 



TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the body they have penetrated. Other patterns have been furnished 

 by the stones which the primitive men have had to use for crushing 

 and cutting tools, and have been developed in working them out. 

 Thus we have the axe, spear, lance, or dart, and arrow (Figs. 3, 4), of 



the paleolithic men, the stabbing dagger made from 



reindeer-horn (Fig. 0), and the stone lance-heads 



(Fig. 5) of the cave-men. 



In the next stage, that of the "neolithic" men, 



the tools are a little better finished ; the weapons 



1 2 



Weapons from Animal Forms. 



4 5 



Palaeolithic. 



7 8 9 



Neolithic. 



cut better, the lance-heads are thinner, sharper, and finer, and pro- 

 visions for fastening to handles appear (Figs. 7, 8, 9) ; and the dagger 

 (Figs. 8 and 9) has developed the form from which all the other hand- 

 weapons have come. 



The bronze age, having the art of working in a more tractable ma- 

 terial, gave an improved weapon. Its dagger is thinner, broader, more 

 pointed, and more dangerous, but yet bears evidence, in peculiarities 

 of shape, that memories of the stone age still survived in the fabri- 

 cator's mind. The blades are still short, but the weapon is furnished 

 with a handle of wood (Fig. 11) or bronze (Fig. 10) or ivory (Fig. 12), 

 often richly decorated and quite small. The ancient nations furnish us 

 longer daggers, or swords of bronze, of various patterns, as the Egyp- 

 tian (Fig. 13), Assyrian (Fig. 14), and Grecian (Figs. 15, 16) swords. 



The earlier swords were used exclusively for stabbing. Adapta- 

 tion to cutting was begun after bronze was introduced, and was de- 



V\ 



10 

 Irish. 



11 12 



English. 



18 14 



Egyptian. Assyrian. 



15 16 



Grecian. 



veloped as the art was learned of forging iron and steel into weapons. 

 The first iron swords copied the shape of their bronze ancestors, and, 

 while they were longer and more formidable stabbing instruments 

 than those, were not much better for cutting. They were broad, two- 



