856 



REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1897. 



and cast away, were flint i)ieks, flint flakes and points, deer antlers, 

 and in the workshops were pieces of the knives, hatchets, arrow- 

 points, and other implements broken in the course of manufacture — 

 the "failures'' of the workmen. 



The tools used for mining- were sharp picks of flint similar to cores 

 tigs. 7, 8, 9, and flakes figs. 3, 4, 5, G (Plate 5), probably held in the hand 

 while digging, and picks of deer liorn, one of the palms forming the 

 handle and a prong forming the pick, such as were found at Grimes 

 Graves by Canon W. Greenwell (Plate 6). There was no evidence in 

 the galleries of the making or sharpening of these implements, and it 

 was believed that this was done at the surface; nor were there evi- 

 dences of the means of ascent and descent, nor yet that of lifting out 

 the flint. 



The entire plateau has been leveled during all historic time. The 

 holes or funnel-shaped excavations which had formerly existed were 



Fij;. 52. 



SECTION OK PIT IN THE PREHISTORIC FLINT MINES. 



Enlarged view of tigure, sliowing ancient worlcinga and how they liavo been filled. 



Spienne.s, Belgium. 



(Letter explanation of strata as in fig. 48.) 



Scale: 1 inch equals 13 feet. 



filled up, and the fields had been cultivated for centuries. There was 

 nothing about its appearance to indicate its wonderful condition. The 

 owner, the farmer, the i)lowu]an, and the hunter, all had passed over 

 its surface from the earliest historic time without any knowledge of 

 what lay beneath the surface, except as they derived it from the chance 

 finds of worked flint and pottery fragments. Prior to the discovery of 

 prehistoric man, this debris told no story and conveyed no idea. After 

 thediscovery of i^rehistoric man, and when wise persons became observ- 

 ant and sought for the evidence of his existence in the chips, flakes, 

 and nuclei, broken and worked in every degree of manufacture, this field 

 became a volume of evidence. During the visit of the International 

 Arcbaeological Congress from Brussels in 1872, its members spread 

 themselves over the field and gathered every morsel which showed evi- 

 dence of human Morkmanship with much tlie same assiduity as the 

 miner in his search for gold. This Hold has always been an attraction to 



