I have been making quite a few handaxes recently, but only just detected that I have a style. It occured to me when I saw these two next to each other and recognised how similar they are. Shape and size was an obvious similarity, and so these two can be recognised as the same ‘type’, and that would be cordate, or heart shaped.
However, it is the process, or ‘technology’ that is the real connector and this relates to how I get my initial flakes. We have very large and chalky nodules, as discussed here and these nodules need breaking down into flakes in order to make a handaxe. Flakes have a thick, bulbar ‘proximal’ end, and a thin and sharp ‘distal’ edge at the other. Intuitively, I seem to make my handaxes with a heavily thinned bulbar section on one side, and a minimally thinned distal edge on the other. This method has developed unconsciously, and I have only became aware of it with these two, and then looking at earlier examples.
In the above video you can first of all see the minimally worked ‘distal’ edge, then the more intensively worked bulbar section, and finally the ripples of percussion indicating this was originally the ventral face of the flake. I’m not sure why my body chooses to work the flakes in this way. I will have to make some more handaxes to find out!
I have become a bit obsessed with twisted cordate handaxes, and in particular, understanding the bodily process of making them. This is my third one, the other two were not ‘quite right’ and ended up being destroyed in the process of getting them ‘right’. This one is not exactly right but has survived. Perhaps it is because it is five o’clock on Friday afternoon I has given it a reprieve.
I need to have the archaeological example next to me whilst making to keep checking I have the twist right. I have read about the making method which was useful, but it is not a conceptual understanding I am after. My aim is for my body to get it, without need of a reference. Watch this space…
As discussed in the previous post Ian brought not one, but two of Mrs Anning’s handaxes to site for me to have a look at. This second handaxe is another amazing example, for both similar and different reasons to the first.
Dealing with ‘similar’ first, you can see from comparing these two photographs that the patina on each surface is different. It looks like the more orange face sat uppermost, whilst the more cream coloured face was face down and protected, for many millennia (my hypothesis).
Moving onto different reasons, the echinoderm in the room is the amazing fossil sitting at the top of the photograph below. I sent a picture of it to my Geology friend, Stephen Poole, and he got back to me with the term: echinoderm. A number of well known handaxes have fossil inclusions and this has led to debates about evidence for Palaeolithic aesthetics. The most recent paper I read (Flanders & Kay 2023) argues that with the famous West Tofts example, it was simply left in because it would have been difficult to remove. I have discussed similar in a previous post.
There is a potentially long and interesting discussion on Palaeolithic aesthetics, however I think we first need to speak to Mrs Anning!
Reference: Emily Flanders, Alastair Key, The West Tofts handaxe: A remarkably average, structurally flawed, utilitarian biface, Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 160, 2023, 105888, ISSN 0305-4403, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2023.105888.
We were away on fieldwork in Herefordshire over July and I am very slowly catching up with things. One of those things is Mrs Anning’s twisted cordate handaxe. Ian Elliott has worked on our sites over a number of seasons, and this year he brought some lithics for me to have a look at, in particular two fantastic handaxes, one of which I will discuss in this post.
As you can see from the video this handaxe is what is termed a twisted cordate. Twisted because the cutting edge undulates around the tool, cordate because it is heart shaped. It bears a striking resemblance to my favourite handaxe within our teaching collection, a 3D model of which can be seen here: https://skfb.ly/ooCKM.
As can be seen with these two photographs, the patina, or colour on one face is different to that on the other. This indicates that it has been sat for a considerable length of time and the lower surface has patinated at a different rate to the exposed upper surface. The edges are in good condition and indicate that it has not been rolled around much if at all. Like the one we have, it is in very good condition. White, Ashton and Bridgland (2019 open access) looked at the recorded contexts of this particular type of handaxe in Britain and dated them to around Marine Isotope Stage 11, so around 400,000 years ago.
The handaxe(s) were donated to Ian’s local primary school, St Mary’s in Dilwyn, Herefordshire by a Mrs Anning. They asked Ian to give a talk about our site, he told them we had very few finds and in response they showed him their donated stone tools. I am both really keen to find out from Mrs Anning where she got the handaxes from, I think Ian is on the case there. I am now keen to make one of these twisted handaxes.
White, Ashton and Bridgland explain the technological process and it sounds complicated, so I am really interested to see if the actual systematic reduction process is as complicated as the descriptions. Watch this space!
References: White M, Ashton N, Bridgland D. Twisted Handaxes in Middle Pleistocene Britain and their Implications for Regional-scale Cultural Variation and the Deep History of Acheulean Hominin Groups. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society. 2019;85:61-81. doi:10.1017/ppr.2019.1
Above is a photograph of the protective equipment I use. Starting from the left, gloves. I do not use gloves myself as I find they inhibit fine motor movement, but for workshops I always offer the option of using gloves for participants.
Next up is the First Aid Kit. I do not use gloves and I get plenty of small cuts on my hands. Consequently, plasters, bandages and bandage tape are the main consumables I use. There is also a great product called ‘Fingerbobs‘ specifically for protecting fingers after being cut. They are excellent and highly recommended.
Third on the list is protective eye equipment. I use glasses as I have reached an age where I need them to see detail, so glasses both protect my eyes from flying flint, and also allow me to see where I am hitting. The goggles are again for workshop participants who do not wear glasses but do absolutely need eye protection.
Finally, some carpet samples that rests on the thigh and are useful for both pressure flaking plus hard and soft hammer work. I am getting more and more used to knapping whilst standing up, and that is interesting in that it limits the size of materials that can be handled and worked (as in the past?). However, in a teaching and learning environment we are generally seated and the carpet is ideal thigh protection.
General guidance for participants on workshops before they arrive is to wear trousers and boots, especially when handling large nodules, but that is about it. I am a trained First Aider for work and fortunately, using the above protective equipment, the worst I have had to deal with is cuts to hands. Happy days!
We had a weekend in Scarborough recently, and on my list was to collect some tabular flint from the beach at Barmston, near Bridlington. Timing wise we arrived late on the Sunday just before the tide started coming in, so I hurriedly filled three carrier bags with likely looking candidates and then we were off back to Manchester.
I really like the flint from this beach and in the past have found it ideal for making ovate handaxes. This time was no exception and up to now I have made one nice large ovate and a couple of smaller cordates, and it is one of these cordates I want to talk about.
The making of the smaller cordate on the left coincided with a visit by Mark Beckett from Europac 3D to show us how to use the Artec Spider 3D scanner. The broad aim was to take scans of both faces, then use the software to stich the two scans together to make a 3D model. So far so good.
Mark set up the handaxe and completed three scans in less than ten minutes. We recognised the value of using 3D models for teaching purposes during lockdown and the Artec Spider seems like a really useful tool for the process. The fact that the software is intuitive to use means we can use it with our students to give them some digital skills and experience as well.
However, what has really got me excited about the scanner is the post processing opportunities. As you can see from all the images on the left, the flint is difficult to read, as the colour and inclusions disguise the scar pattern, and a fundamental part of lithic analysis is reading the scar pattern to understand the process of production. What you see with the images on the right is the ability to manipulate the colour and lighting in order to highlight the scar pattern. This kind of colour manipulation has real potential for helping to ‘translate’ the scar patterns on tricky to read materials. Are we going to get an Artec Spider? I certainly hope so. Many thanks to Mark for coming over to Manchester and running us through the processes. For more information about the Artec Spider checkout the Europac 3D website.
Following on from the previous tools based post, this one is about stones useful as tools to a flintknapper: hammerstones and abrading stones
Last week we were in Pembrokeshire, in south Wales on a family holiday. It is no coincidence that Pembrokeshire has some lovely pebble beaches and that we were on holiday there. Karen loves travel, I love flintknapping and so pebble beaches are one of the areas where our family holiday Venn diagram overlaps. And to reiterate from the previous post, obtaining equipment shouldn’t be a limiting factor if you want to learn how to make stone tools. Just go on holiday! And as you can see below, you may not even have to go to on holiday! but I digress…
Hammerstones first. Not all beach pebbles are born equal. For an ideal hammerstone I look for three things. Firstly, its hardness. The black stone pictured below is an exemplar. I picked it up because it had a shiny smooth surface which suggested it was formed from a compact and dense material, and when handled it felt heavy for its size. I tested it out on the beach and it worked well on other materials and showed minimal damage. Within a few seconds I had identified it was a suitable hard stone.
Feeling heavy for its size is the second factor that is useful. As well as the actual material it is formed from, its shape also contributes to this quality. It is approximately globe shaped, and this provides the greatest mass of material for the minimum surface area. In other words, globe shaped pebbles cram in the most material for their shape and therefore size. So, bringing together a globular shape and a hard material means you are optimising the qualities you want from your hammerstone.
The third factor is more personal to me, how it fits and feels in my hand. Different size hammerstones are needed for different tasks. A small hard hammerstone is useful for tidying up bottle bases after they have been removed from the bottle. A large hard hammerstone is useful for breaking down large flint nodules into more useable flakes. I think this hammerstone sits somewhere in between and will be ideal for transforming large flint flakes into handaxes.
Next up, abrading stones. Most flintknappers will tell you that abrading a platform is very important. For me there are two important reasons: shaping the platform; and getting rid of sticky out bits. To achieve these outcomes I look for two main qualities in an abrading stone. Again, how it fits in the hand, but primarily it needs to have an abrasive surface. The one pictured below I have found ideal for shaping and abrading platforms on flint flakes.
Again, to reiterate from the previous post, it’s not complicated, that is more or less it. Once you start playing with the hammerstones and abrading stones collected you will develop your own criteria and ways of working with them, and that is the really interesting bit.
I have been told off for posting too many pictures of stone tools on social media, and so in response to that feedback here are some pictures of the tools I use to make the stone tools I post on social media. I start from the premise that flintknapping is a practice, and to practice you need both materials to work, and a range of tools to do the work.
In a previous post I discussed how I found quite a lot of copper pipe in a crawl space under our floor. Using that material, this morning I used a hacksaw to cut the lengths into about eight pieces, as above.
I then took a hammer and a doorstep and flattened the cut end of each piece.
That is more or less it. These copper pressure flakers do blunt and wear more quickly than ‘real’ pressure flakers that use thick gauge copper wire, and so a while back I bought this grinder for both antler hammer rejuvenation and pressure flaker sharpening.
As you can see, I have a lot, of now sharp different gauge pressure flakers. I also have a Bronze Age arrowhead workshop next week with ten people, hence doing this today.
These pressure flakers work, and different gauges work well for different stages of the making process. Obtaining equipment shouldn’t be a limiting factor if you want to learn how to make stone tools.
Since coming back from fieldwork I have slowly been sorting out stuff at home and in the labs. In doing so I came across this box given to me by Pete Yankowski at the Chorlton Arts Festival knapping session (see previous post).
As you can see it is full of treasure, however the thing that caught my immediate attention was the modern broken vase base, languishing at the bottom of the pile.
As you can see, it is both thick and has a way in, and so I spent a little time with this yesterday. A day earlier I had worked on another glass base, but hadn’t prepared the edges as well as necessary. Consequently I ended up with an artefact with a ‘step fracture island’ on one face, and some original surface left on the other. Most unsatisfactory! Consequently, I spent quite a lot of time on this one, turning the edges as well as possible.
This particular flake has a story. The reflective bit is a section of original surface that was sitting at the centre of one face, and it needed to go. Because I had spent time creating well prepared edges and platforms I was able to remove it with one accurate and hard blow of the antler hammer. This meant both faces were fully bifacially worked. Most satisfactory!
Anyway, the result is a small and wonky cordate handaxe. There are a couple of small step fractures that I could get rid of, but that would mean losing width, so I am going to live with them. Or should I say, Pete is going to live with them, as the handaxe and flake are now winging their way to him, as a thank you for the original box of treasure.
