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VII. 



PEEHISTOEIC STONE IMPLEMENTS FROM THE RIVER BANN 

 AND LOUGH NEAGH. 



By W. J. KNOWLES. 



Plates XII-XIX. 



Read June 10. Published August 7, 1912. 



The stone implements of prehistoric age from the Eiver Bann and its 

 immediate neighbourhood, and also from Lough Neagh, are peculiar in their 

 character, and differ as a whole from those found elsewhere in Antrim and 

 Derry. I, therefore, consider it advisable to describe those implements from 

 the Bann and Lough Neagh as a group by themselves, and not to mix them 

 up with other objects of prehistoric age found in the North of Ireland. 



In May, 1880, I read a short paper before the Anthropological Institute, 

 London, on " Flint Implements from the Valley of the Bann," in which I drew 

 attention chiefly to the large, coarsely made, pick-like implements of ilint 

 and the pointed flakes with a worked tang. In 1893, at a meeting of the 

 Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ii'eland, which was held in Belfast, I read a 

 paper on " Irish Stone Axes and Chisels,'" in which I treated the Bann 

 group as a priiicipal division. In this paper I dwelt chiefly on the axes and 

 chisels, leaving still a large variety of the Bann implements undescribed, but 

 in the present paper I intend to treat of the whole series. 



Flint and other stone implements were found abundantly when the 

 deepening of the bed of the Bann by the Board of Works was in progress 

 many years ago, and Sir William Wilde, in his Catalogue of the Royal Irisli 

 Academy's Museum, mentions twenty flakes obtained from the bed of the 

 Bann, which were presented by the Board of Works. At a meeting of the 

 Kilkenny Archaeological Society, held in January, 1865, Mr. Robert Day, jun., 

 presented eighteen specimens of flint implements from Toome Bar, the 

 presentations comprising specimens of the perfect spear or knife, the partly 

 formed celt, and the broken flint weapon. In 1867 Mr. Wm. Gray, in 



1 J.iur. E.S.A.I., vol. iii, 5 Ser., p. 140. 



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