No. 421.] PREAISTORIC HAFTED FLINT KNIVES. 5 
still adhering. Its length, including the blades, is eleven and 
one-half inches. The notched blades are fastened with sinew. 
A similar double-bladed knife is shown in the hand of a god 
issuing from the mouth of a serpent sculptured upon one of the 
lintels of a ruined temple at Yaxchilan, southern Mexico. 
It is very probable that the implements shown in Fig. 4 were 
primarily intended as foreshafts for light spears projected with 
a spear thrower, a few examples of this ingenious device having 
been found in the cliff houses of the Southwest. These spear 
throwers have double finger loops, and are in other respects very 
similar to the ancient Mexican atlatl used by both Mexicans and 
Mayas, and represented in their sculptures. The foreshafts of 
the spears accompanying the atlatl in the carvings resemble 

Fic. 4. — Prehistoric knives or foreshafts, 14. 
those illustrated in Fig. 4. A foreshaft similar to Fig. 4, 4, 
has the end opposite the point beveled for inserting into a socket 
at the end of the spear shaft. The lower end of Fig. 4, c, is 
also slightly beveled. The ends of æ and 2 show no beveling, 
and these implements may have been intended for knives only ; 
but if originally constructed for foreshafts to spears, it is prob- 
able, as they are detachable, that they were also used as cutting 
implements. The blades are secured to the hafts with sinew, 
no cement being visible. 
In one of the collections was a spear-like implement tipped 
with a point of black flint closely resembling in form the knife 
blade illustrated in Fig. r, 6. This was secured in the notch 
with cement and cord wrappings. The shaft, forty inches in 
length, is worked smooth and polished, its lower end terminating 
. ina rounding point. 
