HOLMES] ABORIGINAL AMERICAN ANTIQUITIES^ PART I 345 



The abrading crafts employ a wide range of implements and 

 mechanical appliances and are of vast importance in the economy 

 of all peoples in all stages of progress. It is observed that they 

 are applicable in the treatment of all materials in degrees varying 

 with the natnre of the material. Abrasion in its simplest form con- 

 sists of rubbing one object, as of stone, against another with such 

 force as to remove small particles from one or both, but in the prac- 

 tice of the art for ages, abrading implements and devices of many 

 kinds have been evolved and their operation is expressed by such 

 terms as grinding, whetting, scraping, scratching, engraving, saw- 

 ing, drilling, boring, and rubbing. Even the polishing arts, how- 

 soever delicate, act by the removal of exceedingly minute particles. 

 All varieties of stone are abradable, and all stones can be made to 

 serve in the active operation of abrading. Gritty textured varieties 

 serve for the rougher reducing and surfacing, and the finer-grained, 

 even agates, jades, and the like, for whetting and smoothing, and 

 sand and finely pulverized minerals of many kinds are employed 

 in various ways as shaping and finishing agents. 



Many forms of abrading work have been observed in actual oper- 

 ation among the tribes, and not a few are in use to-day; in fact, the 

 processes are in use among other than primitive peoples, and the 

 higher forms of abrading arts in use among lapidaries, sculptors, and 

 builders of to-day do not differ from the primitive forms in principle 

 but rather in the improved mechanical devices employed. 



Grinding and whetting implements are exceedingly numerous 



among prehistoric relics, and their use and manner 



Grinding, Whet- ^^ ^^^^ ^,^^^ ^^ inferred in many cases from their shape 



ting *' ^ 



and the traces of use which they bear. ^ It can not be 

 said with certainty, however, whether a particular form was em- 

 ployed exclusively or even partially in the shaping of stone, and 

 many of the implements probably served for the treatment of other 

 materials, as shell, bone, wood, and metal, as occasion required, and 

 even in the manipulation of pliable materials, as 

 r-rincipai Use hidcs and filaments, but their greatest field of useful- 



ness was, no doubt, in the shaping and finishing of 

 minor artifacts and in giving surface finish to sculptures generally 

 and to building stone. Grinding and whetting stones of three dis- 

 tinct types are shown in figures 201, 202, and 203. An instructive 

 series of illustrations of the use in abrading work of 

 Flake Abraders simple spalls struck from bowlders by the ancient 

 occupants of the shores of Lake Michigan is given 

 by Phillips.^ The various positions and movements are determined 

 by observing traces of the work and wear displayed by the specimens 

 themselves (fig. 204). 



^ Phillips, Stone Implements from the Southern Shores of Lake Michigan, p. 587. 



