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1884.19.349

Spear with spruce shaft and chert point. [LM 23/1/2007]

On display

1884.19.349

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Collection type
Object
Description
Spear with spruce shaft and chert point. [LM 23/1/2007]
Cultural groups
Inuit (Greenland)
Inuit
Date / Period
Date made: Before 1884
Date collected
?1826 1827
Acquisition information
Donated: 1884 Found unentered: Unknown date, uncertain
Materials and processes
Material Wood Plant, Material Chert Stone, Material Spruce Wood Plant, Material Chert Stone, Process Flaked, Process Carved
Dimensions
Length: max 2042 mm
Object numbers
Accession number: 1884.19.349 PR no.: 26/ 11547
Research and responses

?Intended to be used from a kayak to spear swimming caribou. [AP Leverhulme project on founding collection 1995-1998]

Associated publications
Bockstoce, 1977: no 44 - 'Lances ... Belcher collection, part of the Pitt Rivers collection, unnumbered. Length 204.2cm, weight 367.4 gm. According to the PRM Catalogue, collected at Icy Cape (fig 23 a-c). This lance has a spruce shaft, 2.5cm in maximum diameter. Its grey chert point, which has become detached from the shaft is 11.8cm long and 3.3cm maximum in width. The point is very skilfully flaked. There are three similar lance points in the British Museum's Belcher collection (BM nos 8247 - 8249). Two of them came from Cape Lisburne. A similar point was purchased by Nordenskiöld (1882: 271) at Port Clarence and one was excavated from a recent burial at Point Hope (Larsen and Rainey, 1948: plate 94, 6). The fore end of the shaft was split to receive the point's base. It was then wrapped in depilated caribou skin and lashed with three-strand caribou sinew twine. Belcher gave a clear translation of the flaking process used in the manufacture of the points "Selecting a log of wood, in which a spoon-shaped cavity was cut, they placed the splinter to be worked over it, and by pressing gently along the margin vertically, first on one side, then the other, as one would set a saw, they splintered off alternate fragments until the object, thus properly outlined, presented the spear or arrowhead form, with two cutting serrated sides" (Belcher 1861: 138-9) ....'. [AP Leverhulme project on founding collection 1995-1998]

Search terms: Weapon, Hunting, Spear

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