306 RELICS OF EARLY MAN NEAR CHELMSFORD.
flake is very neatly notched on either side of the smaller end. I
submitted this specimen to Mr. Worthington Smith, F.L.S., and
he writes that the notches were probably caused by the flake
having been used to scrape some small object, such as a bone
needle.
From Writtle I have obtained a triangular shaped flint,
ground on both sides.
At Broomfield I found about a dozen of well-fashioned
"scrapers," two of them being of rather uncommon form.
Great Baddow and Ongar have each furnished me with a
fragment of a polished flint axe being the cutting edges, polished.
I have also a perforated Hammer or Mace-head, made from
an oval pebble of quartzite (?) 5" long, 41/2 wide and 11/2" thick.
The hole was evidently drilled from both sides, being 1" in
diameter at the centre and 11/2" at the surface. This specimen I
secured from a private museum, the exhibition space being the
back wall of a cottage. The other specimens consisted of an old
flint lock of a pistol, ornaments in baked clay, cowrie shells and
other bric-a-brac of a similar character, the whole being plentifully
bedecked with red paint; fortunately the hammer stone escaped
with only one spot.
Of Bronze implements I have two celts of the ordinary
type, one 4" long, the other 31/2"; also a fragment of a larger one.
These I obtained from a Marine Store in the town, and they are
probably local in origin. This may serve as a hint to others
living in towns to keep an eye upon similar repositories of
miscellaneous odds and ends.
In conclusion, I hope that my measure of success in a
neglected and unpromising locality may stimulate other members
to examine closely all stone-heaps, ploughed fields and other places
where stones are to be found, and by so doing add a little to our
knowledge of the distribution of the early inhabitants of our
County.