Chapter 4

Fig. 78.—Hematite celt.

These implements were probably used as knives or scrapers, being set into the end of a piece of antler, which may in turn have been set into a larger handle of wood. That some were knives is shown by the edge which is dulled to a flat polished surface extending from side to side; and that many were scrapers is shown by their celt-scraper shape, a half elliptical section, or by the scraper-form edge, seen in the largest specimen. Some, however, have the edge symmetrical, as in the hatchet-celts. One has incurved sides, and is roughened on the sides and on the faces near the top.

Fig. 79.—Hematite celt.Fig. 80.—Hematite celt.Fig. 81.—Hematite celt.

Fig. 79.—Hematite celt.

Fig. 80.—Hematite celt.

Fig. 81.—Hematite celt.

The fact of the ordinary conical or bell-shaped, long-cylindrical, or somewhat pear-shaped stones having been used for pestles is so well settled that no confirmatory references are needed. A few citations may be given in regard to certain forms sometimes differently classed, especially some of the discoidal stones to be hereafter described.

According to Stevens, the corn crushers used by the Swiss lake dwellers are spherical; some are flattened on two sides, like an orange, others almost round with depressions on four sides. They are about the size of a man’s fist or rather smaller. The Africans have a piece of quartz or other hard stone as large as half a brick, one side of which is convex, to fit the hollow of a larger stone used as a mortar.23Evans observes that disks sometimes show marks of use as hammersor pestles;24one found at Ty Mawr was thick, with a cavity on each face.25In preparing pemmican, the American Indians are known to have pounded the dried meat to a powder between two stones.26This gives the impression that any suitable stones may have been used; and the ancient California Indians worked out a round stone as an acorn sheller, modern tribes using any smooth stone.27

Fig. 82.—Handled pestle, with expanding base.

The pestles which have the bottom round or convex are generally found in the same localities as the hollowed stone mortars. Several forms of pestles are represented in the collection. They may be grouped as in the following description and tabulation.

A.With expanding base; bottom flat or slightly convex, often with a slight depression in the middle. Handle tapering, or of uniform diameter to the top; in a few, slightly swelling above as if to give a firmer hold. Top rounded, flat, or pointed. Bottom may be very little expanded or may have twice the diameter of the handle. Probably used for pounding grain or seeds on a flat stone, as it could not be used in a mortar even slightly hollowed. None seem to have been used as mullers or rubbers. They may have served for hammers, and would be excellent for cracking nuts, as the pit in the bottom would tend to keep them from flying out to the side. The type is shown infigure 82, of quartzite, from Sullivan county, Tennessee. The distribution is moderately wide, and the material chiefly granite and quartzite, with a few of other rock varieties, as shown in the table:

B.Almost cylindrical, from 6 to 18 inches long and about two inches in diameter. Some of the larger ones were probably rolling-pins, asthe ends, either from some fancy finish, or because worked to a point, are of a shape that would make their use as pestles impracticable. Even as rollers, some must have been used for crushing grain that had previously been softened or was not fully matured, as they are of a soft stone that would wear very easily. The shorter ones are blunt at the ends, and may have been used in a shallow wooden mortar; none are adapted for use in stone. The class is illustrated byfigure 83, of soft clay slate, from Cherokee county, Georgia.

Fig. 83.—Pestle, long cylindrical form.

Fig. 84.—Pestle, conical.

C.Conical, or truncated cone, bottom flat, convex or curved from one side to the opposite. Some are quite smooth on the bottom as if from rubbing either back and forth or with a rotary motion; while many have the bottom pecked rough, showing use as hammers or pounders. For those with curved bottoms a rocking motion seems best adapted; with the palm resting on the longer side, good work could be done in any of these ways. Typical specimens are shown in figures 84, of quartzite, from Monroe county, Tennessee; 85, of granite, from Warren county, Ohio; and 86, of quartzite, from Saline county, Arkansas. A somewhat aberrant specimen, shown infigure 87, of granite, from Carter county, Tennessee, has an elliptical base, rounded top, and flat bottom; the longer sides grooved for handle. A similar one, of quartzite, came from Warren county, Ohio. There is considerable variety of material, quartzite largely predominating. Althoughthe geographic range is wide, the distribution is rather sparse, and several districts are not represented.

Fig. 85.—Pestle.Fig. 86.—Pestle.

Fig. 85.—Pestle.

Fig. 86.—Pestle.

Fig. 87.—Pestle, grooved for handle.Fig. 88.—Pestle.

Fig. 87.—Pestle, grooved for handle.

Fig. 88.—Pestle.

D.Conical, or truncated cone, with top more or less rounded, very little worked, a stone of approximate form having been chosen and the angles and corners pecked off; bottom flat, and in some quite smooth; used as pestles or mullers. The group is represented by 17 specimens of quartzite, all from southeastern Tennessee.

E.Not dressed at all on the sides, but with both ends worn to a convex shape. Represented by two specimens of quartzite from southeastern Tennessee.

F.Cylindrical, flat bottom, dome-shaped top, these portions having been carefully pecked into shape. Some are smoothly polished on the bottom, but none elsewhere. Those from Miami valley, and one from Kanawha valley are much longer than the others. The type illustrated infigure 88is of quartzite, from McMinn county, Tennessee.

There is scarcely a locality in the country where pitted stones are not found; they are indeed of such frequent occurrence that they are seldom considered worth the trouble of gathering.

There can be no “type” among such crude implements; they are almost invariably waterworn sandstone pebbles, with a pit varying from a slight roughening of the surface to a hollow half an inch in depth pecked in each face. They probably belong with hammerstones, as they seldom show other marks of work, the edge in some being only slightly marked in one or two places, while in others it is much worn.

Various numbers of the Journal of the Anthropological Society of Great Britain and Ireland refer to pitted stones as found in every part of the world. According to Evans, slight pits aid in holding stone hammers; they also prevent the jar to a large extent. If used to pound meat or break bones, it would be hard to hold them when greasy without pits.28Such implements may have had handles of wood with projections to fit the pits,29though this is not probable; but if so a piece of buckskin on the handle opposite the pits would do better and be more convenient to apply.

Conjecture and theory have had full sway in regard to the uses of cupped stones; but the question is apparently far from solution. There is a prevalent idea that they were used for cracking nuts; but why should an Indian make a large number of holes in a great many stones for such purpose? It is true there would be an advantage in having the nut stand on one end; but very few stones have depressions that will allow this.

Of the southern Indians Adair observes:

They gather a number of hiccory-nuts, which they pound with a round stone, upon a stone, thick and hollowed for the purpose. When they are beat fine enough, theymix them with cold water, in a clay basin, where the shells subside. The other part is an oily, tough, thick, white substance ... with which they eat their bread.30

Lawson’s language regarding the Indians of North Carolina is even more definite. He says:

[They gather] likewise hickerie nuts, which they beat betwixt two great stones, then sift them, so thicken their venison broth therewith, the small shells precipitating to the bottom of the pot, whilst the kernel, in the form of flour, mixes it with the liquor, both these nuts [hickory and chinquapin] made into meal makes a curious soup, either with clear water, or in any meat broth.31

Neither of these statements seems to have any reference to cupped stones. The first is a good description of a mortar with a round pestle, while the second says nothing about any particular form of stone; yet they have been referred to time and again as proof of the nut-stone theory. There would be some difficulty in pounding nuts fine in small holes half an inch or more below where the pounding stone could reach.

C. C. Jones32was satisfied that cupped stones were used for cracking nuts because great numbers of nut-bearing trees grow where they are found; while Whittlesey, noting the fact that hundreds of them are found throughout northern Ohio, considered them as sockets in which the end of a spindle rested. Dawson33speaks of “stones having deep hollows in the sides which were mortars for grinding pigments, or sockets for fire drills.”

The cupped stones in the Bureau collection are almost invariably of reddish sandstone, of varying texture, from a few ounces to 30 pounds in weight. The holes are from one to twenty-five in number, of various sizes even in the same stone, and follow the natural contour of the surface even when that is quite irregular; the stone is never dressed or flattened to bring the cups on a level; none show any marks of work, but are the rough blocks or slabs in their natural state.

Many of the holes are roughly pecked in, but the larger ones are usually quite smooth, as if ground out, and almost complete hemispheres. They range from a pit only started or going scarcely beyond the surface to one 2 inches in diameter. The smaller ones with one cup pass into the pitted stones. Occasionally at the bottom of a large cup there is a small secondary hole as though made by a flint drill.

The polished cups may have been used for fire-drill or spindle sockets, though why there should be a number of holes when but one could be used at a time awaits explanation. The rough ones may have been for holding nuts, and so long as they were on the same plane any number could be utilized; but when they are on different parts of the stone, even on opposite sides, as many of them are, the question remains open. Slabs or thin pieces nearly always have cups on both sides, while blocks or thick slabs have them on one side only. On theformer a number of nuts could be cracked with one blow of a flat stone and thrown into a receptacle of some kind, either side of the stone being used at pleasure; but there would be no economy of time or work in this method, and it would be very strange that any one should not learn with so much experience that a nut should never be laid on the flat side in cracking. No theory yet advanced accounts for the greater number of such relics, namely, the irregular fragments of stone with cups at varying intervals and different levels.

No division can be made in regard either to size or material of the stone, or to form or finish of the cups. Many of the smaller ones were no doubt paint mortars. One well finished specimen of this class is shown infigure 89; it is of quartzite from 4 feet beneath the surface in Crittenden county, Arkansas.

Fig. 89.—Cupped stone or paint cup.

Cupped stones are found wherever representatives of the Bureau have worked, and numerous references might be given concerning their existence in other localities.

The objects known as mullers are generally flat and smooth on one side and convex on the other, sometimes with a pit in one side or both, mostly of granite, quartzite, or sandstone; rarely of other materials.

A fine specimen of white quartz from Elmore county, Alabama, has the bottom flat and highly polished, the edge perpendicular to bottom and rounding off into the slightly convex top, with a pit at center.Figure 90represents a muller of marble or crystalline limestone from a grave in Randolph county, Illinois. It has a smooth, flat bottom, with convex top somewhat smaller than the base; around the circumference there is a depression polished by wear. A similar specimen, of diorite, from Carter county, Tennessee, seems to be the lower part of a pestle with expanding base, whose top or handle has been lost, the part remaining having a place for a handle pecked around it.

Fig. 90.—Muller, showing polished surface.

The discoidal stones with this shape were probably used as mullers; they were also used as pestles in the hollow mortars, as the edge is often chipped or pecked, which would account for the pits on the faces.Figure 91represents a muller of granite from Savannah, Georgia. Sometimes the base has an elliptical instead of a circular outline, as seen in other specimens from Savannah.

Mullers are found wherever there are indications of occupancy for any considerable length of time.

Stones evidently used for grinding and polishing need only to be mentioned, as they are of widespread occurrence. Implements used for theformer purpose are made of any siliceous stone of convenient size and suitable texture, from a coarse quartzite to a very fine close-grained sandstone, according to the class of work to be done. The markings on them range from the narrow, sharp, incised lines due to shaping a small ornament, to the broad grooves resulting from grinding an ax or celt into form. Nearly all of those in museums are small specimens used for rubbing; but there are many large blocks in various localities, sometimes several feet square, marked and scored in every direction by grinding or sharpening the large implements on them.

Among the polishers may be included a number of small pebbles of very hard siliceous stone, generally some form of quartz, which by the high polish show long use. The larger ones may have been used for rubbing skins in tanning, as they can easily be grasped in the hand. Very few have changed from their primitive form to a greater degree than would naturally result from the wear upon them. A few very small ones, long-ovoid in shape, usually not over 2½ or 3 inches in length, were probably paint mullers, as they are well fitted for use in small paint cups. Many of the discoidal stones—which will be spoken of under the proper head—may have had these functions. The highly polished specimens are all from the southern states. There is one rubbing stone of pumice from Craighead county, Arkansas.

Fig. 91.—Muller, showing polished surface.

Hammers or hammerstones show every stage of work, from the ordinary pebble or fragment, with its surface scarcely altered, to the highly polished round or ovoid “ball.” They are usually of the hardest available material, and seem to be of more frequent occurrence in the northern districts than in the southern states, though found everywhere. Used in their earlier stages merely as tools with which to fashion other implements, they were assigned to specified purposes when brought to a better finish or form. A typical example, shown infigure 92, is of granite, from Ross county, Ohio.

The Sioux used an oval stone, with a piece of rawhide covering allbut the point and attaching it to a withe handle,34while the Shoshoni and Ojibwa made use of a round stone, wrapped in leather, attached by a string of 2 inches to a handle 22 inches long covered with leather; this was called a poggamoggan.35Rounded stones are said to have been used by the California Indians as bolas,36though it is more probable that they were slung-shots. The ancient Californians worked out a round stone for an acorn-sheller; the present Indians use any smooth stone.37Elaborately carved round stones, mounted in handles as clubs, are known to have been used by the Queen Charlotte Island Indians for killing fish,38and other northwestern Indians have been observed to use a round stone inclosed in a net and attached to a line as a sinker.39

Fig. 92.—Hammerstone.

It is not necessary to quote references to the well-known fact that the Eskimo and the Patagonians made use of round stones of various sizes as bolas. There is no evidence that our Indians ever used anything of the sort.

Three subclasses of grooved stones, differing in essential features from axes, may be discriminated. They are as follows:

Fig. 93.—Grooved round stone.

A.Slightly or not at all worked, except the groove; often showing marks of violent usage. With these may be classed the large stone hammers of the Lake Superior region.

B.Round or ellipsoid stones; in the latter the groove may follow either axis. The type (figure 93) is of sandstone from Carter county, Tennessee.

C.Resembling axes in all but the edge. Of classAthere are none in the collection; their form and size are such that they could have been for no other purpose than hammerstones. Of classBthere are some from Savannah, which may be sinkers or club heads. According to Morgan, oval stones with grooves were secured in the heads of war clubs,40and Carver observed that the southwestern Indians used as a slung-shot a curiously worked stone, with a string ayard and a half long tied to it, the other end being tied to the arm above the elbow.41

The specimens of classCmay be broken axes.Figure 94(granite, from Butler county, Ohio) shows a form quite common throughout central and western Ohio. They are generally small, have evidently never been sharp, and were in all probability intended for hammers from the beginning.

The Indian mortars in the collection are nearly always of sandstone of varying degrees of fineness. As is the case with cupped stones, when made of slabs, both sides have been worked; when of rough blocks, only one.

The Senecas and Cayugas are said by Morgan to have used wooden mortars in which to pound corn after it was hulled,42and it is possible that the long pestles of soft stone were used with wooden mortars, though some are not well adapted to this use. The Iroquois women pounded in stone mortars the stony material used in tempering the clay for their pottery.43The California Indians made mortars by knocking a segment off a bowlder, making a flat surface, and working out with a hammer and chisel,44while the tribes of the interior worked directly from the surface of a suitable rock. The Yokuts, according to Powers, use tolerably well made stone mortars, and sometimes place a basket-like arrangement around the top to prevent the acorns from flying out.45

Fig. 94.—Grooved hammer.

No two specimens of the mortars and metate-like stones in the Bureau collection are alike; the nearest approach that can be made to a classification is as follows:

A.Smooth and flat on one or both sides; for use with mullers; from McMinn county, Tennessee, and Allamakee county, Iowa.

B.With round cavities on one or both sides; for round or cylindrical pestles; from McMinn county, Tennessee. A cobblestone from Bradley county, Tennessee, has a shallow cavity in either side and a pit in the center of each. From Kanawha valley there is a slab weighing about 25 pounds, flat and smooth on one side, as though primarily used with a muller and the regular even cavity afterward made; on the other side a cavity and a cupped hole have been worked in from the natural surface. A slab from Warren county, Ohio, has a shallow cavity worked into one side and a cupped hole in the other. From Union county,Mississippi, there is a flattened bowlder with a shallow cavity on each side; a shallow cup has been pecked on the edge of one of them. From Caldwell county, North Carolina, comes a bowlder of water-worn mica-schist, with a shallow cavity and a deeper one on one side, and on the other a cupped hole opposite each of these cavities.

C.With one side hollowed out, the other flat and smooth. Specimens of this type come from Caldwell county, North Carolina; McMinn county, Tennessee, and Bradley county, Tennessee, the last with a pit in the center and another on the edge of the flat side.

D.With a long, narrow depression on each side. A very large specimen of fine-grained sandstone from Lincoln county, Arkansas, represents this type.

There are, in addition, two pieces of fine-grained sandstone with uniform thickness of less than an inch and about 10 inches across, from Kanawha valley, West Virginia, and Hale county, Alabama, respectively. Both sides are ground perfectly smooth, and flat. The objects were probably for some culinary purpose.

The sinkers in the collection may be divided into four classes, viz:A, entirely unworked;B, notched on the sides;C, encircled by a groove; andD, perforated. Conversely, stones under all these different heads may have served other and widely different purposes.

Of the functions of classA, only those who have seen them in use can speak. Stevens mentions that some tribes inclose a round stone in a sort of net and attach it to a line in fishing;46and no other use can be imagined for some of the specimens in the Bureau collection.

Specimens of classBare found along water courses in such situations as to leave no doubt of their use as sinkers;47they were attached to grapevines and dragged on the bottom of streams to frighten fish into nets or traps.48Those in the collection are made of ordinary flat water-worn pebbles, with notches rudely chipped in the sides; a number are from southeastern Tennessee.

Of classC, while many were perhaps sinkers, more were club heads and slungshots or hammers. A number have been obtained from Savannah, Georgia, more or less worked, some being rounded, with grooves of varying depths and sizes. Small stones of this form are used by Greenland fishermen as sinkers;49and according to Thatcher, a large stone is by the Indians made fast to a sinking line at each end of a net, and the net is spread in the water by sinkers at different parts of it.50

ClassDwill be referred to under the head “Perforated stones,” from which they can be discriminated only arbitrarily.

A number of roughly chipped, somewhat crescent-shaped specimens of argillite, from half a pound to 2 pounds in weight, collected in Montgomery county, North Carolina, may have been used as sinkers.

Only the larger or rougher perforated stones used as implements are included in this class.

Several perforated pieces of steatite, some mere rough fragments, others with the edges smooth and dressed to a somewhat symmetrical outline, have been collected about Savannah, Georgia. Some of these have been drilled, others gouged through apparently with a slender flint. In the latter group the little projections left by the tool have been worn smooth. The hole may be near one end or about the center. Similar pieces have been found in Forsyth county, Georgia; one of these is worked to an irregular pentagon and smoothly finished. From Haywood county, North Carolina, there are some very rough fragments, apparently just as they were picked up, except for the perforation; and a number of pieces of perforated pottery are from Montgomery county, North Carolina.

Perforated stones were used by the southern Indians to drag along the bottoms of streams and frighten fish into their nets and traps.51Four disks 4 to 5½ inches in diameter, with handles from 13 to 17 inches long, were found in a cave at Los Angeles, California,52and objects of this character were, according to Schumacher, used by the Santa Barbara Indians as weights for wooden spades.53According to Abbott many perforated stones are found close to rivers and on shores in such positions as to leave no doubt of their use as sinkers.54Similar stones were used as sinkers by the Scandinavians in comparatively recent times; by the Bechuanas for grinding grasshoppers, spiders, etc., and also as weights for digging-sticks; by some savages in the Pacific islands as clubs; by the Icelanders for breaking up salted fish.55They were used by the Iroquois as weights for fire drills;56by the Eskimo as clubs, having a rawhide handle secured by a knot.57According to Dale,58Layard,59Griesbach,60and Gooch,61they were used by natives of southern Africa as root-diggers (to remove earth from the roots), as weapons, and to give weight to digging-sticks. They were also used by the Peruvian Indians to be thrown with a stick. Disk-shaped andcylindrical throwing stones, perforated for the stick, are found among the Swiss lake dwellings.62According to Evans63they were used mostly as hammers or clubs. They are hard and battered on the edges; sinkers would be of softer stone.

The most complete article that has yet been given concerning the forms and uses of perforated stones is that by H. W. Henshaw.64

There are numerous references to discoidal stones by various writers, but a majority of the objects do not fall under any explanation that has so far been given.

The Choctaw Indians used disks two fingers wide and two spans around in playing “chungke,”65and the Indians of North Carolina were much addicted to a sport called “chenco,” played with a staff and a bowl made with stone.66The same kind of game was, or still is, played with hoops or rings of wood or rawhide by the Iroquois,67the Pawnee,68the Apache,69the Navajo,70the Mohave,71and the Omaha;72also, with rings of stone, by the Arikara,73the Mandan,74and other tribes.

The game of chungke, however, will account for only a small part of the great number of stones of this form. The Indians of southern California, in manufacturing pottery, make the clay compact and smooth by holding a rounded and smooth stone against the inside.75The Fijians, in making pottery, use a small, round flat stone to shape the inside,76while the Indians of Guiana use ancient axes or smooth stones for polishing the clay in making their vessels.77According to Evans,78pitted disks were used as pestles, hammers, or mullers; a thick one with pitted ends was found in a mortar at Holyhead.79Under the head of pestles and of perforated stones further references will be found that may apply as well to this form of implements.

No kind of relic is more difficult to classify. From the smooth, symmetrical, highly-polished chungke stone they gradually merge into mullers, pestles, pitted stones, polishers, hammers,80ornaments, andthe ordinary sinker or club-head, so that no dividing line is possible. Theories constructed on a basis of their use may be far from correct.

They present various forms and degrees of finish; many have the natural surface on both sides with the edge worked off by grinding or pecking, the latter being produced probably by use as a hammer; the sides may be ground down while the edge remains untouched; or the sides may be pecked and the edge ground, being probably of a thick pebble originally. Some of the finer grades, as chalcedony and quartz, that have received the highest finish, appear to have had all the work done by grinding or rubbing, as even those only slightly worked bear no signs of hammering or pecking. When of the harder materials they are generally made of water-worn pebbles as nearly the desired form as can be found; in fact, some specimens which are in their natural state, entirely unworked, require a very close examination to distinguish them from others whose whole surface has been artificially produced. In the jasper conglomerates from Arkansas, however, there is a regular series from a roughly chipped disk to one of the highest polish and symmetry. The larger ones of quartz, particularly those with concavities in the sides, must have been patiently wrought for years before brought to their present state. Many of the smaller ones, especially sandstone, seem to have been designed for grinding or polishing.

Fig. 95.—Discoidal stone.

The following groups are represented in the collection:

A.Sides hollowed out, edge convex; 2 to 6 inches diameter, seven-eighths to 2¾ thick.

1. Edges of concavity sharp.

a.Cavity a regular curve from side to side. The type (figure 95) is of quartz, from Cherokee county, Georgia. There are also, from Kanawha valley, West Virginia, one of sandstone, of which one side has been worked out by a flint, the little pits being distinctly visible, while the other side has natural surface; from Loudon county, Tennessee, one ofquartzite, 6 inches diameter, which has been used as a mortar, the cavities being roughened, with their edges broken and scarred (the edge of the stone is battered entirely around midway between the sides as though used for a hammer); from McMinn county, Tennessee, one of quartzite, about the same size as last, with a slight pit in the center of each cavity, the edges of the concavity being considerably chipped, and the edge of the implement very smooth; from Polk county, Tennessee, one of quartzite, 3½ inches in diameter, with the edge polished except in one spot, where it shows marks of use as a hammer or pestle—it has been used also as a mortar, the edges of the concavity being much chipped and broken; one each from Craighead county, Arkansas, of novaculite; Randolph county, Illinois, of granite; Cherokee county, Georgia, of quartz; and Obion county, Tennessee, of sandstone. In the four last mentioned the entire surface is quite smooth or even highly polished.

Fig. 96.—Discoidal stone, with perforation.

b.With a small perforation at the center. The type is shown infigures 96(of sandstone, from a grave in Union county, Illinois), and97(of granite, from Virginia). There is another specimen, of sandstone, from Red River county, Texas.

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