24 Recent Excavations at Stonehenge. 
the pit explored by him the chalk had been excavated with deer’s 
horn picks, many of which were found closely resembling that 
discovered at Stonehenge. As regards the age of the pits Canon 
Greenwell is of the opinion that they are neolithic, or, at any rate, 
not of the fully-developed Bronze Age, for the following reasons :— 
“The quantity of flint that has been obtained from the pits at 
Grime’s Graves is so great, and the supply of material for imple- 
ments was so very large, that it is difficult to understand how 
operations on a scale so extensive could have been required when 
the use of stone must have been to a great extent superseded by 
metal. During the time when both metal and stone were in use, 
flint was required more for smaller weapons, such as arrow points, 
and for articles like scrapers, saws, and knives, than for larger 
implements such as hatchets.” 
The importance of this comparison of the implements found at 
Stonehenge with those from the localities cited is obvious. It 
tends to demonstrate, in my opinion, that the Stonehenge imple- 
ments are not far removed in time from the others, and hence 
belong to an age antecedent to the full development of the use of 
bronze if not to the neolithic age itself. 
Ciass IV.—Hammerstones more or less rounded. These ham- 
merstones, of which about thirty were found, require but little des- 
eription. They almost all consist of large pebbles or small boulders 
of the hard quartzite variety of sarsen although one or two are 
pieces which have been detached from sarsen blocks. 
Some have been roughly broken into convenient forms for 
holding in the hand, whilst a few have been rudely trimmed into 
more regular shapes. They vary in weight from about a pound up 
to six and a half pounds. 
These rude hammers were undoubtedly employed, as we shall 
see later, in producing the fine pitted markings which the finished 
surfaces of the sarsen stones present. 
Ciass V.—Mauls, a more remarkable kind of hammerstone than 
those just enumerated. 
