92
NOTES ON A BONE OBJECT.
secured by one or more pegs passing through the bone or
whether it was fastened in some other manner. In any case,
the holes would seem to have formed no integral feature of this
class of implement.
Speculation, thus far, seems warranted by the facts, but to
FIG. 14.—BONE PIN-MAKING OBJECT, AND BONE PIN FOUND WITH IT (YORK MUSEUM).
assign any further definite use for these implements is a more
difficult matter, and it is with considerable hesitation that I
venture to offer the suggestion that its purpose may have been
that of a rest, in the scooped out portion of which some material
was placed while it was being manipulated.
An object which perhaps offers
some analogy in this respect is to be
seen in the York Museum. This is a
small squared block of antler or
bone, having a groove along its top
surface (fig. 14 and 14a). It was
discovered in York and with it were

Fig. 14a.—DIAGRAM (nat. size)
OF PIN-MAKING OBJECT SHOWN
IN FIG. 14.
several bone pins such as might have

been shaped and pointed while resting
in the groove.
Grooved bones were extensively used during the Middle
Ages in the process of making brass pins. Such objects, known
as "pin polishers," are perhaps the most plentiful of any relics
found in the soil of London, though I am unaware that they