A few years ago I was walking in a field looking at the ground and I heard a woman’s voice ask what I was doing? She was very curious. I explained I was a Historian looking for stone tools. She and her husband were very interested and I explained that the Stone Age people lived in a throw away society meaning there is a wealth of stone tools to be found. Furthermore, in Cornwall there is little naturally occurring flint which means any that you find is likely to have been carried in by humans. Obviously there is flint driveways but often you can find flint tools. It was on this holiday that I found my first flint tools.
The Dawn of Toolmaking
The first flint tools actually predate the human genus. They are found in Kenya and date from 3.3 million years ago. They were probably made by a hominid called Australopithecus afarensis and were used for cutting fibrous roots or shattering and separating bones.
Stone tools made by humans were made 2.6 million years ago, nearly a million years after Australopithecus afarensis. These tools were of similar technological sophistication and used for the same purpose. This technology was inherited by the Homo Erectus around 1.9 – 1.7 million years ago and went with them to Java and China as they migrated out of Africa. The Homo Erectus were innovators as well as inheritors and they created the bifaces hand axes that appear in the historical record around 1.7 million years ago. The hand axe is a sophisticated tool which cuts, breaks and is easily handled. Homo Erectus were skilled snappers and at Box Grove made hand axes on site for use in butchering ponies.
The Neanderthal Legacy
Homo Erectus was a very successful type of human and lasted for nearly a million years. They are the direct ancestors of both the Neanderthals and us. Neanderthal flint making is named after the Le Moustier site in France. Mousterian flint knapping produces small flint knives and scrapers which makes sense given that we think that it was the Neanderthals who invented clothes.
The Rise of Modern Humans
Between 50,ooo and 10,ooo years ago flint technology changed from flaking the flint to creating blades that we would recognise today. This stage is called the Aurignacian Industry and falls firmly in the era of modern humans. Our ancestors were still hunter gatherers but towards the end of this period we see the creation of ‘villages’ such as Star Carr. We also see the invention of the Microlithic flint industries. These flints are tiny blades that can be attached to spears, harpoons and arrows and used for lacerating prey. They are a incredibly delicate and a fascinating innovation. In fact it was two mircoliths and two cores that I found in Cornwall.
The Neolithic Era and Beyond
In the Neolithic era flint knapping continued and grinding or polishing flints was innovated. Polished stone, particularly from the Langdale axe industry in the Lake District, produced far more sturdy and robust axes, adzes and celts (a type of axe, yes I had to google it). As well as Langdale, Grimes Graves in Norfolk also became essential for the production of flint nodules that would be knapped into axes.
Flint has proven to be one of humanities most useful and enduring technologies. As well as being a source of tools flint and steel can produce a spark allowing a careful user to light a fire or even fire a gun. In the modern day flint scalpels can be used for delicate surgeries and sometimes, flint can even be used as a building material.