Cumhy — Relative Age of Stone and Metallic Weapons. A55 



greatly diminish its power of penetrating hide or feathers ; this 

 would be still further diminished by the projecting shoulders of the 

 shaft, which must have received the head ; the barbs would thus be 

 a hindrance to the effect of the arrow, and it is difficult to account 

 for their use. 



When steel is employed the vertical angle may be made very 

 small indeed, and its penetrative power would be thereby increased, 

 but it would all the more easily slip out of the wound, and the 

 animal would be likely to escape ; to prevent this barbs were 

 invented. 



Barbs, therefore, are a very doubtful improvement to a stone 

 arrowhead, but very necessary to one of iron : does not this suggest 

 a suspicion that the flint weapon was an" imitation and cheap sub- 

 stitute for the more costly metal ? Our lady-archers sometimes 

 lose their arrows in long grass : what would they do in the ling, 

 whins, and marshes of a British forest ? To lose a steel arrowhead 

 for every other grouse they killed would make fowling an expensive 

 amusement, and it remains to be seen whether a hand-bow of ash or 

 horn could send a flint-headed arrow through the hide of a red-deer 

 or a wild bull at the distance within which these animals will allow 

 themselves to be approached. Till this is determined we may con- 

 jecture that for large animals — stags, swine, etc. — the aboriginal 

 Britons would hazard the loss of a steel arrow, and shoot smaller 

 game with a less costly weapon : that the flint should remain though 

 the iron has vanished, is no more than the proper consequence of the 

 imperishable nature of the one and the rapid decomposition of the 

 other. It is, therefore, certain that the flint implements and weapons 

 found in Britain and elsewhere do little to prove that those who 

 used them were ignorant of the use of iron ; and if they could have 

 proved it, even this would be as far as ever from proving that the 

 Assyrians and Egyptians of the same period were equally ignorant. 



Hesiod's fable respecting the metallic ages might seem to imply 

 that the use of metals was coeval with the human race ; and this 

 is, perhaps, supported by the Egyptian histories, which make Vulcan 

 the father of Sol. Mosaic history attributes the invention of metal- 

 lurgy to Tubal-cain, Adam's eighth descendant ; and the places above 

 cited, from the LXX. and from Herodotus, corroborate the existence 

 of a stone period, which must, however, be placed very long before 

 the flood. 



If we partially adopt Lucretius's conjecture respecting the in- 

 vention of metals, we might suppose that the flint -breakers had dis- 

 covered nuggets of gold, and the possibility of using it for vessels. 

 The accidental burning of woods and smelting of ore on mountain sides 

 had, perhaps, some foundation in truth, and opened the way to the 

 discovery of other metals more capable of taking an edge or a point; 

 but, in whatever way the discovery was made, we shall still find it 

 difficult to distinguish flint implements older than the invention of 

 metals from those of later and, perhaps, even of Eoman times. 

 Careful examination of the implements themselves, and classification 

 of their forms and apparent uses, the place and part of the country 



