61 
may be seen in the Peabody Museum, Cambridge, Mass., and others from 
the refuse of a prehistoric Iroquoian site near Roebuck, Ontario, in the 
National Museum of Canada, Ottawa. Some from the coast in the vicinity 
of New York city, 1 and from Mayslick, Kentucky 2 , are in the American 
Museum of Natural History, New York. 
All these objects made from incisor teeth of the beaver and woodchuck 
may have been used as carving knives for wood working. Such knives, 
hafted in wooden handles, are used like chisels in making snowshoes 
and also as crooked knives by the eastern Cree 3 . The specimens found 
on this harbour were probably hafted in handles, possibly like the one 
made of antler still holding a cross-section of an incisor of a beaver, which 
was found at Rocabec, New Brunswick (Plate XX, figure 6, Cat. No. 327 
in the Patterson collection). The tooth is set in a hole through the end 
of the handle, so that the natural cutting edge is in line with the axis 
of the handle; but this edge is broken off and lacking. The lower surface 
of the handle, from which the cutting end of the tooth projects, is flat; 
the upper surface is made up of two long, curved surfaces that fit well 
in the bend of the fingers if the handle is held flat side to the thumb and 
the knife drawn towards the user, as is customary in the region. The Mie- 
macs, since first known by white men, have used exclusively for wood 
working a knife which they always draw towards them. As to shape, this 
knife handle may be compared with those from Micmac Indians (Plate 
XXI, figure 4). It will be noted that both have a curve at the top with a 
flat surface for the thumb on the convex edge of this top part. An incisor 
tooth of a beaver, hafted in a transverse hole in a piece of antler with the 
cutting edge of the tooth in line with the axis of the handle, from Prince 
Edward county, is in the Chadd collection in the Provincial Museum, 
Toronto, Ontario, and a handle of antler from the Roebuck site, with a 
longitudinal excavation in one side of one end of suitable curve and size to 
hold a lower incisor of a beaver, is in the National Museum of Canada. 
Knives made of bone are referred to by Denys 4 as having been used. 
Though these may have been of bone, like the five lance-shaped points 
found at Merigomish (Plate V, figures 18, 19), it seems probable that he 
used the word “bone” for tooth and really referred to knives similar to 
those above described. 
Knives Made of Stone . Sharp chips and flakes of stone (Plate III, 
figures 5, 6) and chipped points may have been used occasionally as knives. 
The edge of the left end of the object chipped from metargillite (Plate XVI, 
figure 7) is rubbed smooth, possibly from such use. Scrapers chipped 
from stone (Plate XVII, figures 1, 2) may have been used as knives for 
whittling, planing, and scraping. 
Knives Made of Copper. A small, thin knife-blade of copper from the 
prehistoric cemetery is Cat. No. 34169 in the United States National 
Museum, Washington, D.C.; three knives made of copper are listed in 
the catalogue of the Patterson collection as found in the same cemetery, 
1 Cf. Skinner (b), p. 230. 
1 Cf. Smith, p. 198. 
5 Cf. Skinner (a), p. 52. 
« Cf. Piers (a), p. 112. 
62185—54 
