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Hafting a Stone Blade
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Dr Gheorghe wanted to make a reconstruction of a stone knife, a hafted blade. Only by making copies of ancient artefacts can you gain a good understanding of the minds of ancient peoples, and the restrictions under which they worked.
This is an ancient blade, since the materials for making flint blades are unavailable at present. This blade was found at Ostrovu Mare, and the number on it, visible in the later photographs, is the catalog number from Dr Gheorghe's private museum.
It is about 15 x 4 x 0.5 cm.
The handle is made from a green tree branch which was specially chosen to be as long as the blade, and a little curved along its length to better fit the hand. Dr Gheorghe says that it would be better to use a well seasoned, dry piece of wood, as it will not shrink as green wood does. A good strong species is the Locust Tree, Robinia pseudacacia, known in Romanian as Salcâmul.
From Wikipedia:
Salcâmul (cf. turc. salkâm) (Robinia pseudacacia, familia Leguminosae) este un arbore melifer, cu tulpina înaltă, până la 25-30 de metri şi ramuri spinoase rare, fiind aclimatizat în Romania. Provine din continentul nord-american.
Robinia pseudacacia is a nectar bearing tree, with a trunk of 25 - 30 metres, sometimes with thorns, originally from North America, but now acclimatised in Romania.
Photo: Adrian Gheorghe 24th December 2007
First two pieces of plaited rawhide are fixed around the wood at the rear of the handle, which will hold the blade firm as they dry, since if the wood is cut to accept the blade before fixing them, the wood will split.
Photo: Adrian Gheorghe 24th December 2007
In the front part of the handle a long deep cut is made, to fix the stone blade.
Photo: Adrian Gheorghe 24th December 2007
After much effort Dr Gheorghe has fixed the stone blade into the large cut in the front part of the wooden handle, where it is held by the two rings made from rawhide, or possibly in ancient times by some sort of cane.
Photo: Adrian Gheorghe 24th December 2007
The final hafted blade.
In order to better fix the blade in the handle, ancient man may well have used some sort of glue, such as the sap of trees such as Birch trees.
Photo: Adrian Gheorghe 24th December 2007
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Alexis Project Filiasi/Romania
RC J/263/230/2007 CIF 21464151
Email: [email protected]