I

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THE]::: THE
Tosmonion Field Noturolists' Club.
Vol. 1. DECEMBER, I907. No. 3.
Some Jmplements of toe 1.9asmanian
:Jlborigines.
BY FRITZ XOE].1LTIXG, );1.A., Ph.D.
vVhenever f.n old camp is carefully ex-
amined, a number OIf more or less round-
ed stones, most of which arf', however,
in nbroken. all(} frr.gmentary cond'ltion,
Ican be picked up. Complete specimens
are very rare, llnd. wben in a preserved
condition they exhi-bit quite pewliar fea-
tures. Alway'." one, but mostly the two,
0PFo,;ite fiat sides show in the centre a
rough sl1ght
1
y cone:\ ,'e pro-
duced by repeatpd blows. On closer ex
amination, it will be seen that frequently
the edge alw shows strong trulee" of
Little attention il"S so farbe('n paid to
these remari<a)ble specimens. bLlt llumer
Oil:; theuries llDYe been as to
their use, Tbe most COillmon v:ew is
that they served a'il k.mll1er stones, and
that the rough central depre,;sionii
selTed as res t'lng places for timmb and
first finger when the stone was used. A
8iwple experiment will pr-oV'i) that SUCil a
view is untenable, becnu-se it is Impossible
not only to get a sufficiently strong grip
on tlip stone. 'but, also, most of them are
too large an& heavy to !hi) properLy llluni
pulatell if beld 'In slllch a position. ApJlrt
'from other reasons, it is evident that
theory must be doJsmissed as infeasible,
hut. then, the question arises for what
purpose can tlley ha"e been 'l.nere
is no doubt that () good deal of 'York has
betn in shaping these stones, and
-there ios als-o no doubt that most 01 these
wue de-
stroyed again, one should almost feel in-
dined to say in a Vicious way. Though
th-e breaking wa.s prolbabl.y frequently
done by blows, numerous instances sug-
,
geost quite another way, namely, by heat-
ing in the .fire find afterwards pouring
water over ,th-em, which naturally result-
ed in the destruction of the speoi-
men so treated. Before advanc-
ing the new theory sugges-ted by
-thesi) Qlb.servations, it will be
advi,,[llble to desK:ribe a few characteristic
spedmen-s. Frg. 1 and Fig. LA. is
specimen Wilich was collected b.y Mrs.
OldmeacJJlVs, late of Woodlands, .anet
kindly given to me. It is th-i) largest speci-
men that has so fiar come to my notice,
Illeasllring in length, 6in. tn width,
;lin. ';n thickness, and weighing 7lb. 50z.
a nIp. Its shape is irregularly ova.] or
cl1iptieal, inasmuiClr a's onc side bulges out
a little. thereby -spoiling the regular -oval
for Ill. Thc whole sha'pe is unquestionably
that ofa houlder or pe'bble such as is
produce(} by runn1ng water, anel picked!
up in numbers in any creek or in the
alluvLJiI boulder !beds. It is impos"lible to
as,certain the nature of the rock without
serioll'sly damaging this 'beautiful sped-
men. As far as I can judge, it appears
to be a quartzite or quartz-ltic sand'3tone
of consid'2rable hnrdness; a little caiVcrn-
OHS, but of fine -texture. The super:fidaI
colour i,.'i a light brown, :but it is proiba-ble
that this colour i" due to weathering,.and!
tha t the ;original colour was light yellow
-a-t one side show.s lighter spots
of this colour. The w.hole surface, '!IS far
as it has not been affected by su;>equent,
working, 1s remarkably -smooth l)lld ,pol-
ished. TIle albo"e measurement.s
that thcoriginal pehble was laterally
compressed. and the two flat sidias shOW'
that they haYe been lSubjecte'JJ to a con-
siderable amount of 'Work. One side.
( I )
THE TASMANIAN NATURALIST.
which, for want of a ,better tei'm, we
may designate ,the upper side. shows fl
dia,tly concave rath'ilr rough depression of
4cl;.in. by 4in. dlameter. If a ruler is
placed on tile top, deepesL part is
a'bout lin. below the ruler's but as
it is fair to assume that the 'original ,sur-
face was not a,bsoluDely flat, it is pro
ba'ble that a lenticular part o'f the pe,bb!e,
mea'Buring 4!in. ,by 4in., and ,having a
greatest thickness of !in., has been 're
moved. The surface is rough; but it is
also unquestionable that the original
roughnes's has been smoothed down
by rubbing or grinding. The op-
posite lower side is, slightly con-
vex, and in it s centre there is an
irregularly shaped, very rough mark
of about 2:l:in. diamilter. This mark cleflr
ly shows that it. has been produced by
numerous blows applied to this part of
the surface. Th';) peripheral ed'ge io:!
rounded and smooth. Specimen I J<'2, 2A,
2B, which I found near Kempton, 15 an
oth'er type of this kind, though some
what differing from the former. 1t halt
been broken into six pieces, and 1 ,SUI:)'
ceedecJ in 1gettiug all o'f them but one,
thougb they had .be'iln scattered over an
area of about 100 square yards. When
pasted toge'ther they proved to be the
,finest specimen that has so far eome un
doe.r my notice. It is almost completely
circular, measuring 6!in. in diameter, but
only 2iin. in tilicknes9; it is, t:lerefore,
strongly compresosed. The weigllt is 51b.
!lo?. amp. Tile rock 'ls a coarsely
grained q:uartzitic sandstone ofsligh tly
pink1.sh colour, though in some parts this
ha" .bilen replaced by It whitish colour.
The upper side is almost to its whole ex
t'ent hollowec. out, and therefore con
cave. As in its part it ilas been
hollowed out to a depth o.f and as
it is only fair to suppose that the or1gi
nul gUl'faee was the ,same as the convex
lowr side, we assume that u lenticular
mass of stone of thickness, measur
iJlJg 8;bout 51in. in difl met'er, has been
tediously removed by grindlug. The
peripheral edge is 'WeU rounde
l
(), but it
Elee ms that it ha.s :been considerahly he
laJboul"ed: by heavy blow<8, whose
are very conspicuous. The mosL common
type is represented by Fig. 3. This spe
cimen comes from ISouth Arm, and
measure.s .'iin. in length, 3iin. in width,
and liin. in thi()kness, weighing 211h. loz.
a,vdp. It is regularly oval in shape,
though the two longitudinal sides are
slightly flattened; it is rather compr,essed,
but the upper find lower sides are slightly
convex. The material is dal'k, rather fine
ly crystalline Dialbas. The upper side
shows in the centre a deep r'ough d>epres
,sion of a'bout !in. diaometer, ani) around
the 'Surface is nic'illy polished and
smooth. Exactly <lpposite on the lower
surface is rough mark, though
( 2 )
not quite flS wel! defined-. The peripheral
edge is rounded, but the two longitudinal
.'Ji(J"s snow distinctly that it has 'lJ.een
tiattened ofi', and marks of blo'\Vs are
also viosilble at ejther end, on the shorter
sia2s. _\ similar specimen is figured in
J<'ig. 4. This has been found at Shene
(Portville), anll it measures iht.. by 4:}4n.,
. the thickness being harely Ij\in. The
we-ight is 21b. 130z. aVdp. The shape
i"'! irregularly oval, and it is unquestion
ably that of a ,flat pel>ble that had been
picked up in t:le nearest creek. 1'he ma
terial is Diahas t:le black crystals of
augite, contrasti'ng sharply the
g!'l'yiS:l green ground nms". The upper
side has apparently l>e,en smoothed, and
in the I:)en tre i" a deep, rough depression,
measuring about lino 'in tliameter. Xo
such depression exists on the opposite or
lower Elide, which represents tlrt! unaltered
original sur'lace o,f the Tile differ
ence in the smoothness of tile upper and
lower 'Side is very marketl; the iower s'lde
sh,ows that smoothness so peeu :iar to
waterworn pe,bbles, but on tire upper
side it has disappeared, and been f{'placetJ
by a sllr.iace showing numerous fine
streak'S or scratches, all running in t.he
same direction. such as are produced by
a rubbing or g-rind1ng action. The most
pEculiar and perila'Ps th,e most interest
ing type is reproduceci in Fig. 5. Tilis
has been found on the famous camp
at the Old Beach Ibv Mr. Anth'onl. lot is
Ill! oval pehble of Diabas, measuring 5in.
in length. 3iin. in witlth, but only Ll;in.
in tilicknes's, and weighing Hb. 80z. avtlp.
Both the upper and lower side,s are
flat, but 'While the lower side is rflther
rough,pwba'bly owing ,to weat.ilering, the
upper ,sid>c has 'been most elaborately
polished and ground. Th-e has
even been extelloled to the per;pheral
'part. and a fine edge has heen produceCJ.
When held in foavoura,ble light, three
rough marks can be seen cross
'lng obliquely; it is probwble tilut
these are parts of th'il original surface,
whidl have been preserved dl1riFlg the
gr-lnding. The specimen is well preserved,
exc'ept for a large fragment broken 'off
from the margin. The a'bove are only a
few of the specimens I have eJCamine'tJ,
but th,ey serve as good illustrations of
th'e type"'! met with, and We flfC now able
to draw a few general eon<:'usions.
E,'ery'one of the specimens tliat has come
examination proves by it.s general
shape that it was originally an ordinary
water'\Vorn pebble, such as may be pick
ed up in flny stream or alluv;,-.J boulder
'bed. It was certainly es'Sential that such
a pe'lYble should be f1at-'that is 10 say,
that width ancl breadth eFeedd the
thickness, inasmnch as pebbl'es of this
type are always naturally of fln ellipBcal
or round sbape. It that the
general olttliJie wa"'! more of a secondary
THE TASMANIAN NATURALIST.
lCharacter. This compressed shape speaks
.rather against the US'tl as a ham:ner-stone,
!:IS it can easily be proved by experiment
that one' of the more globular boulders
would ssrve thi" purpose m
1
1ch better
than a' flat specimen, as it re"ts much
'ootter in ,the hand than the latter. The
size was aJ.so 1mmaterial. The iargest
spEcimen iiitherto found ,ures Sain.
jn length and weighed! 7lb. 5-oz.; but there
arc numerous specimen" which aril much
smaller; apparently the most procurable
size was about; I) to 6 inches in length.
flat pebb.les had the1r naturalLy-
smooth surface improved by polishing.
As to that th'cre cannot be tile s.'ghtest
doubt. Perhapol this view might be
questioned with regard to specimens Fig;
1, Fig. 3, and Fig. 4, though the traces
of polish'lng are very conspicuou.s in Fig.
4; 'but there <'annot be the .slightest dou'bt
that th'il specj,mens Fig. 2 and Fig 5 have
'been subjecte(J to a considera1)le amount
of grinding and polishing. In "pecimen
Fig. 2 the upper surf<lli'e has been deeply
hollowed out and. a.fterIYar(Js carefully
smoothed by polishing; the some npplies
to spedmen Fig. 1. It is prohable that
these depressions have been prodouced by
a prolongcd grinding action by mean<s of
aroother pehble, because it (loes nOL seem
very 11kely that such evenly concave sur-
faces could be produced byimmlll'ering
and subse,quent polishing. In this. case
the surface would be rougher anll mOre
UJleven. This C"an OISD 'be proved by ex-
lhlriment. Let anyone take two ordinary
iDiaba<s pebbles, using one as a hammer-
stone, and a rough spot showing rh'e re-
peated blows will soon 'be produced. But
of .smooth1ng and polishing
this rough mark will :be very imperfect.
Du the other hand, if the two pebbles are
groundo against each o,ther, and assi<sting
this Pl'OceSS :by the use of sand, a nice,
smooth snrfac,e can bil produced. The
:hest proof that these stones 'have been
treated hy grinding and 'PoH"bing is given
,by. s'pecimen Fig. 5. A smooth surfacer
seen in th'ls s'peldmen, can only he pro-
c'mced by scrapin.g or grinding. As. scrap-
is out {)f the que<stion, on of
the hfHdness O't the t.he only pos-
siMe way to produc1l this fcature is by
grinding and polishing. That the art of
grinding wa'S, therefore, not wholJ.y un-
known to the Tasmanilm alborigint's may
be tak;Jn as granted, but 'lt is ,oqually cer-
hin th9t they never applied it in ihc
manufacture of their stone implements
(Eolithes and Archaeolithes), 'but only
used it for the produdion of the speci-
mens h,ere described. This is a very re-
markable fact, giving ri<se to a cO'ns1der-
able amount of If tbe abo-
rigines knew the art of grinding,
:and the specimen.s here descri'bed leave
no doubt that they did, how is it, then,
(3 )
that they did not apply it in the manu-
facture of their tools It seems fairly
,tha t the grinding and polishing
:was done inal'd'er to improve on the ap-
pearance of thOse already smooth water-
worn pehblils. BlIt, then, why did they
not subject ,the chippedo archaeolithes to
a similar suhsequent treatment? 'rhev
kr..ew that tiley could improve, lInd
dally alter 'thil ordinary pebbles, and
fromaur way of reasoning, we <should
tMnk that it 'Would have been the most
natural thing to trea't the roughly-
chipped knives and choppers in a similar
way. But that the a'borigines did not OD
it 'ls an absolute fact. and this shows, in
my opinion, a perfilct a,bsence of a pro-
gl'essiv-e mind. They were incapable of
thinking further than their forefather'!
diu, and this lack of inventive genius, so
essential to th,c progres.s of mankinc}, is
most pmbaJJly the true re>ason of the ex-
termination O'.f their race. We may now
raise the question, for what purpose did!
th'ese remarkwble 'Stones serve Tileir
shape 'proves that a con,slderwble amount
of labour has been bestowd on them. If
we consider the long ti-me it would take
to produce a like Fig. 2, we lire
bound to assume -that these stones must
have played an important role in th'e life
of the a:borigine<S. But what their object
really was is unfortunately a mat-
ter of conjecture. As I .,t'a ted
above, very few complete speci-
mens are found; 'by far the mu-
jority are broken. and ilven the complete
5pecimens are generally a little damaged
by fra,gments being broken off. This
fcomillJgly insig'J.ifkant obsfTvaiion is,
however, of the greatest inlportance; if
we be:tr in mind that so maeh labour
ha.;; been spent in their produ<Ction, it is
imnossible to assume that th'''se stone's
we;'e ,wcidentaJly destroyed. Even tl.le
primitive Ta ;;mRnian a.'borigines kne,,"
the value of labour, and .to assume that
they wue so careless as to allow one
of theL- treasure.s-and <stont's that were .
haped 'by many a laborious day of hard
grinding must represent treasures
--'being a'ccidell'tally destroyed is highly
improbable. It is more prohwble to
sG')Jp'lse that thEse stones were pur-
posely destroyed. In examining the
broken and specimens we
lIotice anot'her curioUls -fact; j,t i.s certain
I,hat some of thesp,cimens were broken
by smashing them; a fine spedmen I
found on Hope Bea'ch shows 'ira'ces of
an almost sa,va,ge desire to des'tl'oy it by
bloW's. A fine specimen from Hokoby.
whieh has bl'en kinC];ly given to me by
:Mr. Chipman, ha" an edge whict11 has
been severely treated by bloWB, 'iJut tll,'
hardness of the ro,ck, a finely-grained
quartzite or quartzitic sandstone, with-
t'hese and, though the
1
1
,
.
!D ..
OF TASMANI AN ABOIUGINES, showing",that the inhabitants
of the Island tlHclerstood the ar t of grindi ng stones. Probably with l'cligiollS ceremonies.
I all I l A- Bou lder or Pcblole l mpicmcut, inc hes in lcnq:th, cnriollsly shaped , found by Mrs.

'! anti - Qmll'tzitic Sandstone, 6.1 inches in diameter, round ue:l r Kempl on.
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..
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i I
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,
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STONE ()F l' AS;\.'I AN I A'\! A BOHHHl\'E'::':, showing that the oT'iginal inhabitantIJ
of the Is\;\ nrl Illlllc l' stoo(1 the art of grill(ling f'rokl.hlyassocia,tea with rel igious ceremonies.
21l - Qllartziti c Sa.nli stone, in diameter, fOHlld Ilear J\cmpto!l.
il -:3 inches in length Cl' ystalline Diabas, found lI.t Sonth Arm.
4- 7 inches long. made out f\ 11t pebble, found, at Pontvill c.
5-Peculial' O,' al Pebble. fOHlld at the famOll s Old Bea,ch Camp by .i'dr. Anthony.
( 5 )
THE TASMANIAN NATURALlST.
sp dmen has been badly damaged, it
coU'ld IlJt ,be ,broken. There is hardly
any spedmeIl has come under my
notice vhat more ,clearly proves the two
.facts-(a) Careful production by grind-
ing the two tlat surface." with th" two
rougll central depression!;: (b) subse-
t] lwnt a tte,mpt, of destruction by means
of blows. 111 other specimens it is,
lHH\e\'er, ill1pos:;ible to aSS'llIIl! that they
,\\'ere slll';h;lleJ ltnlt broken by blows. The
. .specimen,s, notahly Fig. 2, shows no truces
that they have been .. ubject, d to such
rough treatment. The fractures are
clean and even, and t'his suggests only
one way of destruction, namdy, \)y fire,
The sp,',cimens were heated first, and
afterw;Lrds water wa" poured over them,
nnt! t:lis must naturally result in a par-
or total destl'Uction. This vLw is
borne out by a further obtiervation. Some
of th,) diabas pehbles exhibit peculiarly
cuned face:; of fraction, such as would
rt'sult '\vihen flukes Iby 'meaM 'of :hea'Lmg
and sudlleu cooling are "plintered ott,
but \\-ilich could not be produced if tile
fiakp, had been broken off bv blo'\\'8. We
kn'Jw now t'ill'se htbOI:ioLlslv manu-
faC"tlll\ d stones were purposely "de..,troy-
e<i, pit,her Ily llleans of or by heat-
illg :l1lll sudden cooHng, and this fact at
Ol.ee lilllit,; Ollr range of specuhLtion. It
i" it well-known fact that \t)wer races
oftl'n prodllee IU'l>oriously work, d
artidpd auti destrov them afterwards it
I'ueh IlrtidpH 1\re with their
primitive notion of religion. It is there-
fore v.l'y prob'Lble tlia t the specimens
here de"crihed 'were in some sort of a
'way connected with the religious or
superstitious ideas of the Tasmanian
aborigines. 'Vhat their ideas were,
whether they were omens, good
or bad, or in some way con-
nected with the wOI'shi p of tlle souJ.s of
their -'leceased re-Iation .. , I am unable to
;,ay, but it is unquestiona'ble that this
the,or,)' easily lI>ecounts for otherwise
irrec'mciJable fa,ets, viz., a tedious pro-
ductbn and subsequent intentionlLl ,de-
.. I may now mention another
mo"t interesting bet. Among the
impliments of Europe, in
lll.rticular France and England, similar
8p:<'1'11en8, t-holllgh pretty mre, have been
found. The Frem':l called them "mor-
tiers" ard jt, has been assumed
tha,t sen'ed fo]' grinrJ,ing the red
Gchre primith'e m III was in the habit of
using. It Sfems \'ery doubtful that so
much labour "hou!,l he bestowed O!l, the
protl'udion of for whic'h any
fairly 5!l!00th ",lab of stone would have
just as well, if not better. Sir
JO'hn E\'ans figures in his fundamental
work on t)he stone implements of Great
Britain, p-a'ge 238, numerous specimens
t 61
vf this ty.pe, and' be fu>sumes them to 'be,
h,tnuner-stones, though he has apparent
ly somt doubt8 as to the correctness of
his view. "However that may be, and.
I think 1 have sufficiently proved that.
these Slpecimen8 cannot be hammer-
stones, tile rClmarkable fact remain .. t,hat,
spedmens of tlhe type here described are
dmractl'ri .. tic of the' ul'chaeoliithic indus-
try, ani have be,n found in Europe, a,,"
well as ,in Tasmania. If my theory as
to their use by the '!'asmanian abor,igines,
be correct, and SO far there seem;; to
be very little doubt, this would'shed a
l'eculi.ll' light on the ,customs of archaeo-
lithic mlLn ill Europe. If the imple-
ments u'led are the .. a.me, if the religIOu!>
I'otion" areth2 "same. is it too impro-
bable an assum,ption thwt the 'l'asma-
nian aborigines were the last remains.
of a race which during ar,chaeoIithic
is to say, prev<ious to the
advent of the great ice floes-inhabited
Europe? T'lle above was already writ-
and really to go to press when 1
ha,ppeneu to look IIp Bonwi()k',s "Daily
Life ane! OrigiIi of the 'l'asmanians;'
\V'here on page I found the following
1II1POI'Lwt i:enLlrks;-"'When the Quaker
}les .. rs_ Backihouse and
,"V'aiker, were" visiting the remnant of
the tribes carried to Flinders Island, BfuSS
Strait, they ,saw a poor old lubra busy
in pblCillg" together "sundry "tlat
"tones" marked Vilriously with black
and lines. These, she ex-
plained to the' strangem, were her
country people absent from 'her_ One,
n "tone than the rest, "pre'sented
a ,fat black IVoman far away. 1t
is ju.tpossible t'lHt the Tasmanian was
in that way cOlllmuning with the-
,;pil'it,s of her friends lost in the black
war. UnwiUing to refer to them as
dead, she spoke of th'QIl as 'plenty long
way.' I have not heard of any'
fiat round stones like some found in Ire-,
land, Denmark, and Caithness, having
a sligb,t depression in the centre on 'both
sides, as of a thum!bmark, urrle.ss those
noticed by these two friends on Flinders
Island were so." The observations of
Messrs. Backhouseand Walker, who may
most probllibly have overlooked the rongh.
depreSl'ion's in the ,centre, prove conclu-
sively that t'he theory ,above advanced
is correct. In fact, the remark con-
cerning the targer stone rspresenting a
"fa t bla-ck woman" proves tha,t these
stones were connected with "absent"
(de'Ld) indivitluals, indicating a very
cl'Ude form of worship of the souls of
deceased relatives. Thi., view also ac-
count.s for their frequent oc()urrence.
though it still lea yes the fact why these-
stones were intentionally destroyed un-
eXlplained.