ARROWPOINTS, SPEARHEADS, AND KNIVES. 



945 



ion of arrowpohits. It has Uvsually been supposed that this spreading 

 base was to be hehl between the tliumb and 

 tingers, gindet fasliion, and used as a drill. 

 Sojue of these implements appear to have 

 been made primarily for this purpose, while 

 others have the full and complete base, stem, 

 shoulders, and sometimes barbs, of the stem 

 end of an arrowpoint, and of these it has 

 always been said or supposed, that the per- 

 forator or drill had a secondary use, and was 

 possibly a broken arrowpoint. The blade is 

 chipped away on either edge until the pile or 

 bore is very nearly round and quite pointed. 

 Tliese have never been classed as arrowpoints 

 or spearheads, but it is curious to remark that 

 the only wounds shown in the two human 

 skulls in the U. S. National ^Museum should 

 have been nuide by stone implements or arrow- 

 points of this peculiar kind. Reference is 

 made to tigs. 198 and -00, where the skulls 

 are represented with the wound and weapon 

 as originally found, but the latter are also 

 withdrawn and shown in their entirety. 

 \A"itli this apparently conclusive evidence of 

 their use as arrowpoints, they can not be 

 omitted from this classitication. 



The bow and arrow as a projectile engine 

 comprises several parts. This paper has 

 treated only one, the arrowpoint or j^ile, as it 

 is called in archery, for the reason that the 

 investigation has been confined in point of 

 time to the prehistoric, and all or nearly all 

 parts of the engine, except the stone arrow- 

 point, have decayed or been destroyed by 

 lapse of time. Bows with their strings, arrow 

 shafts with their feathering, spear shafts, and, 

 with a few excepted illustrations to be given, 

 knife handles, have all perished. Dr. Otis T. 

 Mason says:' 



Of the ancient inhabitants of this continent the 

 perishable material of arrows constituting the shaft 

 and other parts has rotted and left ns naught but the 

 stone heads. Even those of bone and wood and other 

 material have passed away, so as to leave the im- 

 pression that the Indians of this eastern region used 

 only stone; but all authorities agree that other sub- 

 stances were employed fjuite as fre(iu('ntly as the last 

 named. 



North American Bows, Arrows, and Qnivers, Smithsonian Report, 1893, p. 654. 

 NA.T MUS 97 00 



