314 



GENERAL VIEWS ON ARCHAEOLOGY. 



obliquity of the cutting edge turned towards the person, the face A, 

 which is then inwards, is found to be almost flat, whilst the opposite 

 exterior face is much more convex. It would be the reverse if the 

 instrument were held in the left hand, but keeping naturally the obli- 

 quity of the knife edge towards the person. We remark also that 

 the instrument thus held suits the right hand much better than the 

 left. It is therefore evident that this hatchet-knife has been made 

 intentionally and with forethought to be used by the right hand. 



Fig. 11. (i) 



Stone hatchet. Denmark. 



Other wedges, with more prismatic forms, with straighter edges, 

 terminated at the other end, not by a point, but by a surface perpen- 

 dicular to the longitudinal axis of the piece, were evidently designed 

 to be fitted with the handles, to be used as hatchets, properly speaking. 

 Finally the stone hatchets, bored transversely for the introduction of 

 a handle in the manner of our woodmen's axes, might possibly have 

 been intended for some particular use, for they are found much more 

 rarely than the others. We are, however, able to prove directly, that 

 the knives of the age of stone were, at least partly, composed of these 

 wedges ; they are, with the exception of the chisels and gouges, the 

 only instruments of flint with a cutting edge produced by the grind- 

 stone ; 1 and we have seen that the marks of knives on the bones of the 

 Kjoekkenmoedding came from instruments sharpened by grinding, 

 which were, therefore, necessarily the wedges alluded to. The splin- 

 ters of flint, usually called knives, appear to have served as saws. 



Fig. 12. (i) 



Hatchet-knife of hronze. Denmark. 



It would seem that the Greenland knife was still in use during the 



1 In high antiquity they were only acquainted merely with the fixed grindstone which is 

 often found. The rotary grindstone only makes its appearance later. 



