A STUDY OF PREHISTORIC ANTHROPOLOGY. 



639 



Every finder should examine his specimens carefully for evidences of 

 any sort of attachment, and if found the specimens should be for- 

 warded for examination. 



Fig. 13. 

 CiiiPPRD Dagger of Gbat Flint. 



(Cat. No. 933U, U. S. Nat. Mus. From a mound in Alabama. Collected by N. T. Lupton.) 



The Museum possesses one specimen of a knife or dagger with the 

 handle complete, chipped from a single piece of flint somewhat after 

 the fashion of like implements from Scandinavia. It also possesses a 

 dozen or more specimens of knives, principally from California, the 

 handles being short, with the flint blade inserted and fastened with 

 bitumen. In some cases the handle has been preserved, but in others 

 the bitumen alone remains as evidence of the attachment. 



Fig. 14. 

 Flint Knife, attached to sliort wooden handle bj bitumen. 



(Cat. No. 14329, U. S. Nat. Mu3. Southern Utah. Collected by Maj. J. W. Powell.) 



The Museum possesses a specimen which has served as a knife, but 

 without any handle being attached thereto ; instead it is wrapped with 

 a strip of otter skin. It is a large specimen, 7 inches long, 2^ wide, 

 and one-half inch thick, and is leaf-shaped. It was collected by Capt. 

 Philip H. Eay, U. S. Army, from the Natano band of Tinneh (?) Indi- 

 ans at Hupa Valley, California. It is of mottled obsidian, which is 

 said to have come from Oregon. Captain Ray relates that these imple- 

 ments were held in great veneration by the old Indians, and that this 

 had been used as a charm or talisman. In writing of the Hupas, Mr. 

 Powers, in his " Tribes of California," says, page 79 : 



There are other articles paraded and worn in this and other ceremonial dances 

 which they will on no account part with, at least to an American, though they some- 

 times manufacture them to order for one another. One of these is the flake or knife 

 of obsidian Or jasper, I have seen several which were 15 inches or more in length 

 and about 2^ inches wide in the widest part. Pieces as large as these are carried 

 aloft in the hands in the dance, wrapped with skin or cloth to prevent the rough 

 edges from lacerating the hand, but the smaller ones are mounted on wooden handles 

 and glued fast. The large ones can not be purchased at any price, but I procured 

 some about 6 inches long at $2.50 apiece. These are not properly "knives," but 

 Jewelry for sacred purposes, passing current also as money. 



