340 Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy. 



arrow-teads and scrapers of flint, axes of black rock, and also pottery. 

 They fonnd a well-marked hut-site, "svith old surface undistiu'hed, 

 ■vrhich they excavated, and obtained an interesting series of objects. 

 I shoTV in jS'o. II. a stone axe and some knives and scrapers of flint 

 which I excavated fi'om a hut-site in these sandhills in one of my 

 early visits, and I presented all the objects, with the exception of the 

 anvil stone (flg. 8) which was found with them, to the Marchioness of 

 Downshire, and they are now in her collection. The axe shown in 

 fig. 4 is a nicely-polished stone axe of greenish colour, which appai'ently 

 had never been used after having been fiidshed. The knife (fig. I, la) 

 is nicely di'essed on one side and only partially dressed on the other. 

 The scrapers shown in figs. 3 and 5 are of a somewhat larger size 

 than those usually found on these sandhills, and the k nif e-like object 

 shown in fig. 6 is dressed on one of the long edges, and shows very 

 little di-essing on the other. Judging from the way in which similar 

 flint knives, found in the lakes of Switzerland, are mounted, it is 

 probable that this implement had the rough or upper edge in the 

 figui'e inserted in a handle of wood, bone, or horn, leaving the better- 

 di-essed edge fi-ee for cuttrag purposes. The anvil stone (fig. 8) was 

 found with them, besides other ruder objects (figs. 2 and 7), and some 

 fiakes and cores. All were found in the old hearth, about 2h yai'ds in 

 diameter, which was composed of dark carbonized material accumu- 

 lated from repeated fires. One of the flints showed the cracked 

 appearance of that substance when burned in the fii-e (see fig. 7). I 

 got from the sites in these sandhills during the first two days' explora- 

 tion over 2000 manufactured objects in flint, consisting of scrapers, 

 which, as is usual in all the sites, were largely in the majority, arrow- 

 heads, flakes di'essed as knives, concave scrapers, and anvil stones, 

 showing the pitting sometimes on one side, but oftener on both. The 

 series of these implements which was found shows the pitting ranging 

 from the flrst slight puncture on some specimens up to pretty deep 

 hollows in others (see examples in figs 116 to 118, Xo. XIY., p. 381). 

 Stone celts in the polished state, pottery, and the usual broken and 

 split bones of ox, deer, &c., and also shells were obtained. 



I show in fig. 9 a rude and partially-made object of coarse-grained 

 rock. One side is well dressed to a fiat or only slightly curved sui'face, 

 showing good and careful chipping. The other side is only partially 

 dressed, and shows a large hump with a portion of the outside crust 

 still remaining (see two views of this object, figs. 9 and 9«). The 

 stone was originally a waterworn boulder, as one can see from the 

 remaining piece of crust, and would have made an axe of medium 



