Vol. X. No. 4] Grooved Stone Hammers from Assam 109 



[N.S.] 



the Indian Museum in 1908, through the Viceroy, Lord Curzon, 

 to whom they had been presented. 



It is interesting for the sake of comparison to enumerate 

 briefly the occurrences of similar forms from other countries in 

 Eastern Asia. So far as I am aware, belted hammerstones 

 have not been found in Burma, Malaya, Borneo, Indo-China 

 or Yunnan. Only a single specimen is recorded from the 

 whole of the Chinese Empire, where it was discovered by 

 Mr. 8. Couling, a medical missionary of the English Baptist 

 Mission in Ts'ing-chou Fu, Shangtung Province, in the vicinity 

 of his station. It is described and figured by Berthold 

 Laufer (Jade, A Study in Archaeology and Religion, Field 

 Museum of Natural History, Publication 154, Vol. X, 1912, 

 p. 50), along with a grooved hammerstone found in a shell 

 mound north-west of Koraskoosk on the southern shores of 

 baghahn Island by Dr. Iijuina, (derived from the Journal of 

 the Anthrop. Soc. of Tokyo, Vol. XXI, No. 247, 1906), and 

 the oblong grooved maul, which is still a common household 

 utensil among the Chukchi to the far north-east on the Beh- 

 ri . n 8 Strait. The shell mounds of Ainu origin in Japan have 

 yielded objects which are regarded by some writers as grooved 

 stone hammers and by others as net sinkers. 



Grooved stone axes are common in North America and 

 seem to be very generally distributed through the United 

 estates. An excellent example is preserved in the Indian Mu- 

 seum collection, and figures are given by Charles Rau (Smith- 

 sonian Contributions to Knowledge. The Archaeological 

 collection of the United States National Museum in charge of 

 the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C., 1876). 



There is no evidence to prove that the grooved-stone axe 

 which only occurs sporadically in Eastern Asia, did not evolve 

 as an independent unit in the North American culture area, 

 out on the other hand, the lack of evidence in this particular 

 case, does not lessen the probability that in certain othei 

 archaeological types America borrowed from Asia. 



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