ARROWPOINTS, SPEARHEADS, AND KNIVES 



825 



I'aleolithic period. Tbey were probably never used with a handle, for 

 it is hard to conceive an impleinent so ill contrived for attachment to 

 a handle. They are nearly the shape of an almond or peach stone 

 (fi^s. 1, 2). A ])ortion of the natural crust of the Hint pebbles was left 

 at the butt of some of these implements for a grip, thus showiui; tliat 

 they were intended to be held in tlie hand, and not to be handled for 

 use as spears or javelins. These implements are not thin and flat so as 

 to be inserted in a split handle, and whether attempted longitudinally 

 as for a spear, or transversely as for an axe, it would be Avith difficulty 

 that any of them could either then or now be retained in a liandle. If 

 iusertedin a wooden han- 

 dle a sufficient distance 

 tohold, a blow given witli 

 force would drive it into 

 and through the wood? 

 and would certainly split 

 the handle. Being in- 

 sufficiently inserted, it 

 would fly out. 



We are not driven to 

 theory entirely with re- 

 gard to this matter, for 

 aside from the fact that 

 some of these are left 

 with the butt of the flint 

 pebble for a grip, the in 

 veutive genius of man 

 has not yet been able to 

 discover and employ a 

 handle that could be at- 

 tached to these or similar 

 implements without be- 

 ing open to one of these 

 objections. Attempts 

 have been made in this 

 direction by several per- 

 sons, notably in a series in Oarnavalet Museum, the municipal museum 

 of Paris. An inspection of this series or of any of the implements 

 themselves will show the impracticability of handling them. 



It does not necessarily follow, because these Chelleeu implements 

 ere not put in a handle and used as spears, that, therefore, the man 

 of that period had no spear, for a sapling or branch of a tree, sharp- 

 ened and hardened by fire, would have made a most effective weapon of 

 the spear or javelin sort. It may be objected that no such objects have 

 ever been found, yet this is not conclusive against the i)ossibility of the 

 wooden implement having been iiuidc, for, being wood, it might have 

 decayed long before the historic i»eriod. 



Figs. 3, 4. 



MOUSTERIEN SPEARHEAD OP" FLINT. 



Obverse and reverse. 

 Le Moiistier, France. 



Cat. No. 9015, U.S.N.M. Xatural size. 



