STONE AGE LNT NEW JERSEY. 331 



sion ; but there are manj- ciiTumstances which it is not easy to re.rou- 

 cile with that conchision. In common with the perforated copper 

 plates, ah^eady described, they exhibit slight traces of friction upou the 

 edges of the holes, which, for the most part, are as sharp as if newly 

 cat. This could hardly be the case had they been worn suspended from 

 the neck, or upon any part of the person." Xotwithstauding this objection 

 we have considered these perforated plates to have been ornaments for the 

 person, from the fact of their position, which is always the same when 

 found in graves. On opening a grave, the invariable position of the 

 trinkets and weapons has been as follows : weapons on the right side ; 

 pipe on the left ; small vase (pottery) at the feet, and the ornaments 

 near the region of the breast. If these " breast-plates," as we have 

 termed them, had been some domestic implement, as a " bow-string 

 twister," it seems strange that they should have been invariably placed 

 upon the breast of the person buried. x\gain, why so large an amount of 

 ornamentation, as is sometimes seen, if the stone relics in question 

 were not used for decoratiou ?* 



Figure 170 represents a not very abundant, curiously-wrought stone 

 ornament or implement, we cannot determine which, but one which was 

 once used over a large extent of territory.! This specimen is a fraction 

 over four and a half inches long. The body, or main portion, is very 

 accurately sloped to the back, which is a narrow flat ridge, of a uniform 

 width of one thirty- second of an inch. The '' head" of the specimen is 

 nearly square, and not unlike the head of a blunt muzzled mammal in 

 shape. The knob-like protuberances stand out from the head one-third 

 of an inch, and have a narrow neck, about one-half the width of 

 the " knob " itself. The bottom of the implement, as the illustration 

 shows, is tiat. There is at each end of the bottom of the speci- 

 men a small hole, drilled obliquely upward and outward, meeting' 

 another drilled hole, made from above, and extending doAvnward 

 until it meets the other. These holes are characteristic of this class 

 of relics. There appears to be a considerable diversity of opinion 

 as to the nature of these relics, all of which are about the same size as 

 the one figured, and, as a class, they are more than usually uniform. 

 No illustration of this pattern of ornament that we have met with has 

 the knob-like protuberance, or head, so noticeable as this. 



170. Schoolcraft! has designated this form of relic as a handle for a 

 knife, the blade of which was obsidian or jasper. One of these "knife- 

 handles" is figured, found on Cunningham's Island, Lake Erie, New 

 York, which is considered to be " apparently a sacrificial or a flaying 



* Figures 109 a-b represent the two sides of breust-plate, foiiiul near Fi'eebohi, N. 

 J. The very elaborate ornamentation on each side, and the careful notching certainly 

 are to be taken us proofs that the specimen itself was an ornament, and not a mere 

 implement. This specimen was received from Rev. S. Lockwood, of Freehold, N. J., too 

 late for further description, 



tSijuier & Davis, Anc. Mon. Miss. Valley, p. 239. 



illist. Condit., &c., N. A. I., vol. iv, p. 17.", pi. xxiii, tig. 2. 



