18 THE ZOOLOGIST. 



EARLY MAN IN BRITAIN. 



SPURIOUS FLINT IMPLEMENTS. 

 By W. G. Clarke. 



The making of spurious flint implements is an industry by 

 no means confined to the last few years. Practically as soon as 

 it was found that the evidences of man's handiwork from the 

 river gravels of England had a marketable value, men skilled in 

 flint-knapping began to make imitations of them, " Flint Jack" 

 especially obtaining notoriety for the skill with which he imitated 

 prehistoric weapons. At a meeting of the Norfolk and Norwich 

 Archaeologists' Society in 1861, Mr. Pengelly stated that he knew 

 there were some clever people in the neighbourhood of Caistor 

 who could make ancient flint knives. And when the Suffolk 

 Institute of Archaeology met at Thetford in 1866, one of the 

 workmen excavating gravel told the members that if they but 

 gave him a few days' notice prior to their next visit he could 

 procure as many implements for them as they wished. Need 

 one doubt that he looked for assistance to the skilled knappers 

 at Brandon ? The natives of East Anglia do not as a rule try to 

 sell spurious bronze or iron weapons to the unsuspecting archae- 

 ologist : they limit their operations to imitations of flint imple- 

 ments. Rusty horse-shoe nails have, however, been offered me 

 as iron spear-heads ; and an egg-spoon that had been buried 

 about ten years relegated to the Lake-dwellers. But in these 

 cases the false descriptions were made through ignorance, and 

 not of deliberate purpose as is the case with many of those who 

 sell spurious flint implements. The district is so noted, and is 

 visited by so many archaeologists in search of flint imple- 

 ments, that there are unrivalled opportunities of foisting off 

 forged specimens as genuine antiques. The Brandon knappers, 

 with their marvellous inherited skill and constant practice in 

 making gunflints, turn out specimens of prehistoric arrow-heads 



