ART. XVII -METHODS OF MAKING STONE WEAPONS. 



By Paul Schumacher. 



[Plate 29.] 



I.— THE MANUFACTURE OF STONE WEAPONS. [*] 



During my rambles among the remnants of our Pacific coast abo- 

 rigines I had an opportunity, among the Klamath Indians, of gaining in- 

 formation of the manufacture of stone weapons, for which my interest was 

 not a little stimulated by extensive collections made by our party among 

 the deserted hearths of the coast tribes. I had the good luck to meet 

 the last arrow-maker of the tribe, located on the right bank and near 

 the month of the Klamath Eiver, who has since joined his forefathers in 

 the happy hunting-ground. He showed me the mode of making stone 

 weapons, of which the following is a description. 



For the manufacture of arrow- and spear-points, knives, borers, adzes, 

 etc., chert, chalcedony, jasper, agate, obsidian, and similar stones of con- 

 choidal fracture are used. The rock is first exposed to fire, and, after a 

 thorough heating, rapidly cooled off, when it flakes readily into sherds of 

 different sizes under well-directed blows at its cleavage. The fragments 

 are assorted according to shape and size best corresponding to the 

 weapons desired ; the small ones, best fit in shape and thickness, are 

 used for arrow-heads ; similar sherds, but larger in size, for spear-points ; 

 the long narrow pieces for borers, and so on. To work the flakes into 

 the desired forms, certain tools are required, one of which is represented 

 in Fig. 1. It consists of a stick (a), which is in form and thickness 

 not unlike an arrow-shaft and about 1^ feet in length, to one end of which 

 a point {!)) is fastened, of some tough material, as the tooth of the sea- 

 lion, or the horn of elk, and even iron among the present Klaraaths, 

 although the rock does not work as well, and brittles where the edge 

 ought to be sharp. The point is represented in natural size in Fig. 2 

 to better illustrate its beveled curve, which form admits a gradual press- 



[■* Translated by the author for the Bnlletia from an earlier publicaciou in Archiv fiir 

 Anthropolof/ie, vol. vii, pa;;e 203 et seq. Tlie article may be considered supplementary 

 to Arts. II. and III., by the ^anie antiior, in the iirst number of this volume. — Ed.] 

 2 1} H 



