351
OBSERVATIONS ON THE IMPLEMENT MADE
FROM A DEER'S ANTLER IN THE MUSEUM
OF THE ESSEX FIELD CLUB.
By EDWARD LOVETT.
[Read October 1st, 1989.1
IN reference to the interesting description of a stag's antler
implement in the last part of the Essex Naturalist (ante
p. 311), by Mr. Worthington Smith, I am inclined to think that
the tool was intended for a Bark-peeler, as suggested by Mr. Read,
though I see no reason why it should not have been used as a
pottery-smoother as well.
Our ancestors of the pre-historic period no doubt had the
little failings which some of us inherit, one of which was to use
the first thing that came to hand, provided it was suitable, and I
fancy many of their tools served more than one purpose.
In our day how often you see a boy cracking nuts with a
hammer; I have myself used a stone for a hammer in my garden,
when the procuring of the hammer proper necessitated a walk to
the tool-house; whilst the hand loom weavers in some parts of
Ireland actually use as a "rubbing-bone" a glazed earthenware
cup originally made for holding blacking, but now sold for the
purpose aforesaid.
Such instances are abundant; but to return to our imple-
ment. Some of the northern tribes of the North American
Indians used "Bark-peelers." of bone and elk horn very similar
in form to the Wormingford example, whilst the Swiss Lake-
dwellings yield adundant examples of tools which were probably
used for this and other purposes. It is, however, in instances
where implements of early type still survive that we meet with
the best evidence of the probable use of objects of pre-historic,
age about which we may have our doubts.