NELSON] 



CELTS, ADZES, AND FLAKING TOOLS 



91 



STONE IMPLEMENTS 



Celts and axes of nephrite or other hard stone are fashioned by 

 grinding into shape and sometimes by pecking, and are finished by 

 grinding or friction with other stones. Knife blades, lance points, and 

 whetstones are also made from these substances in a similar manner. 

 The stone celts, axes, and wedges are mounted on handles of wood and 

 deerhorn and are very skilfully used by the Eskimo for hewing and 

 surfacing logs and planks, although at the j)resent time they are being 

 displaced by iron and steel tools obtained from white traders. In a 

 kasMm on the lower Yukon a plank was seen that was made many 

 years ago by use of a stone adz. It was 25 feet long and four or five 

 inches thick. The surface bore so many marks made by the hacking of 



Fig. 26— Flint flakers (J). 



Stone adzes that it looked as if it might have been cut by beavers. 

 Flint knives, spearheads, and arrowpoints are made by flaking. The 

 flakers are made of small, rod-like pieces of deerhorn, wood, or ivory, 

 fastened into a slot at the end of a handle, usually of ivory or deer- 

 horn, with wrappings of sinew or rawhide cord. 



Figure 26, 3, represents one of these flaking implements from Kotze- 

 bue sound. Figure 26, 4, is another flaker from the same locality, with 

 a handle made from fossil mammoth ivory. Figure 20 2, from Hotham 

 inlet, and figure 26, 1, from Point Hope, represent flakers with similar 

 handles. Figure 26, 5, from Kotzebue sound, has a handle of deerhorn. 



Formerly small fragments of flint were used for scraping down the 

 surfaces of bone, ivory, or deerhorn articles in the course of manufac- 

 ture, but for this purpose steel or iron implements are now in common 

 use, and naturally produce much more satisfactory results. 



