Art in Shell of the Ancient Americans / Second annual report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1880-81, pages 179-306

by William Henry Holmes

CELTS.

Implements of this class are generally made from the lower part of large univalves. They were probably used in a variety of ways, with handles and without. The spine-like base of the shell forms the shaft, the blade being cut from the broadly expanded wall of the lower whorl. Nearly all the specimens in the national collection have been obtained in this way. In Plate XXV three very fine examples are figured. The specimen illustrated in Fig. 1 is more than usually well fashioned, and is extremely massive, having the proportions and almost the weight of typical stone celts. It is five inches in length, two and three-fourths in width, and nearly one inch through at the thickest part.

The edge is even and sharp, and but slightly rounded; the beveled faces are quite symmetrical, and meet at an angle of about 35°; the faces are curved slightly, following the original curvature of the shell, and the sides are evenly dressed and taper gently toward the upper end which shows some evidence of battering. The surface of the specimen is slightly chalky from decay. It has been made from a Strombus gigas, or some equally massive shell. It was collected at Orange Bluff, Fla., by T. S. Barber. A profile view of the same specimen is presented in Fig. 2. The specimen shown in Fig. 3 was found in Madison County, Ky., and is the only one in the national collection from the Mississippi Valley. It was obtained from a mound, but in what relation to the human remains I have not learned. It is fashioned much like the specimen just described; it is one and a half inches in width at the upper end, and two inches wide near the cutting edge. It has also been made from a very massive shell.

Fig. 4 illustrates a specimen from St. Michael's Parish, Barbadoes, West Indies. It is made from the basal portion of a Busycon perversum. The handle is curved and neatly rounded, and the edge is beveled or sharpened on the inside only.

PL. XXV—SHELL CELTS.

1. Orange Bluff, Fla. (3/4)
2. Orange Bluff, Fla. (3/4)
3. Madison County, Ky. (3/4)
4. Barbadoes, W I (3/4)

In the national collection there are about twenty of these objects; six are from Tampa, Fla.; four of these are fragmentary; the remaining two are short and triangular, and have been made, one from a Busycon perversum, the other from a Busycon or Strombus. The cutting edge is wide and well sharpened. Two are from Cedar Keys, Fla., and are made from thin-walled specimens of the Busycon perversum. The larger is six and one-half inches in length by three in width toward the base; the other is about one-half as large. Both are rudely made, and show the effects of use. Five came from East Pass, Choctawhatchie Bay, Fla. Two of them are fragmentary; one of the entire specimens is very well made, and has a regularly beveled, oblique edge, while another is remarkable in having a curiously worn edge, which is deeply serrated by use or weathering. The majority of these specimens are from ancient shell heaps. Three are from St. Michael's Parish, Barbadoes, West Indies, one of which has already been described.

Professor Wyman, in the Naturalist for October, 1868, illustrates two of these celt-like implements from the fresh-water shell heaps near St. Johns, Fla. One is made from a triangular piece cut from a Busycon carica, so as to comprise a portion of the rostrum, which serves as a handle, and a portion of a swollen part of the body, which terminates in the cutting edge of the tool. The sides and apex are smoothed and rounded, while the base is regularly rounded and ground to an edge like that of a gouge, but with the bevel on the inside.

This author states that another specimen, obtained at Old Enterprise, shows clearly that it was detached from the shell by first cutting a groove and then breaking off the fragment. He also gives two views of a small shell celt which, from the exterior markings and the thick ridge on the inside, is thought to have been cut from the base of a Strombus gigas. "The broad end is ground to a blunt edge like that seen in most of the stone chisels from the other States, and the other is ground to a blunt point."

These implements are frequently mentioned by early explorers. In Plate 12 of the "Admiranda Narratio," an Indian is represented[38] with a shell implement, scraping away the charred portions from the interior of a canoe which is being hollowed out by fire. The same implement was employed for removing the bark from the tree trunks used.

Catlin, in speaking of the Klahoquat Indians of Vancouver's Island, says that "a species of mussel-shell of a large size, found in the various inlets where fresh and salt water meet, are sharpened at the edge and set in withes of tough wood, forming a sort of adze, which is used with one hand or both, according to its size; and the flying chips show the facility with which the excavation is made in the soft and yielding cedar, no doubt designed and made for infant man to work and ride in."[39]

Wood, speaking of the Indians of New England, says that "their Cannows be made either of Pine-trees, which before they were acquainted with English tooles, they burned hollow, scraping them smooth with Clam-shels and Oyster-shels, cutting their out-sides with stone-hatchets."[40]

The method of hafting these implements, when used for axes and adzes, was doubtless the same as that employed for stone implements of similar shapes. This is illustrated in Fig. 2, Plate XXVII, the handle being securely fastened by cords or sinews. It will be seen that but one of the specimens mentioned comes from the interior, and that from Madison County, Ky.