222 NOTE ON A WEST AFRICAN "STRIKE-A-LIGHT."
The tangs of the iron portion of the African specimen are
pierced in order to hinge it to a wire running through the lower
edge of the bag. I have not noticed that any of the Romano-
British period objects are similarly pierced, but it is easy to con-
ceive many ways in which these might have been fastened to a
leather bag or some similar object. The object shewn as Fig. 5
is especially suggestive of such fastening. Moreover these
ancient iron objects are so rusted that any piercing would in all
probability be filled up.
Most of the Asiatic strike-a-lights appear to have straight
blades rivetted to the bag, along its length, with several small
rivets, the joint being covered with a band of brass. But I have
recently seen in the Cambridge Museum of Archaeology a
specimen from Kashmir, which was presented by Mr. Edward
Lovett.
Its native name is Chue lune, or Fire pouch. By the kindness
of the Curator, Baron A. von Hügel, I was able to examine it,
and was delighted to find, that, although rivetted like most
Asiastic specimens that I have seen, the blade has two tangs
exactly like the West African specimen, or the Romano-British
objects to which I have already referred. It is by means of
rivets, which pass from front to back, through the two tangs,
that the blade is fastened to the pouch.
Whether the idea of the formation of the African specimen
is of native origin, or whether it has been introduced, it is still I
think an equally suggestive explanation of the objects belonging
to the Romano-British period.1
I have also figured (Fig. 9) a Strike-a-light from China,
which was presented to the Geological Museum, Jermyn Street,
by the late Dr. William Lockhart and was pointed out to me
by Mr. Rudler. Not that this specimen bears directly on the
subject, but it is analogous in the form of the blade and serves
to show how widely this shape is distributed. A very similar
Fire Steel was found in a grave in Gölland, and is figured in
The Viking Age, Du Chaillu, Vol. 2, fig. 1361, p. 478.
1 Mr. Reader has kindly presented this object to the Club's Museum.—Ed.