Skip to content
Pitt Rivers Museum
AboutHire the MuseumNewsletterUniversity of Oxford

1884.140.1740.1

Adze with wooden haft. The handle is loosely bound with cane. for the shell blade see 1884.140.1740 .2. [CW [OPS Move] 11/1/2017]

1884.140.1740.1

Digital asset copyright: Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford

Terms and Conditions

If you wish to order a high-resolution image and/or licence its use for print or web publication, exhibition, film, promotional product or any other use, whether in the academic or commercial sector of any print run, then please visit photographic services.

Collection type
Object
Description
Adze with wooden haft. The handle is loosely bound with cane. for the shell blade see 1884.140.1740 .2. [CW [OPS Move] 11/1/2017]
Long description
Adze with wooden haft [.1] and shell blade [.2]. The handle is loosely bound with cane. [MJD 21/08/2014]
Date / Period
Date made: Possibly before 1878
Date collected
?Prior to 1878
Acquisition information
Donated: 1884 Found unentered: 21/08/2014
Materials and processes
Material Wood Plant, Material Cane Plant, Material Shell, Process Bound, Process Socketed, Process Carved
Dimensions
Depth: max 49 mm total, Depth: max 49 mm, Width: max 90 mm total, Width: max 90 mm, Length: max 260 mm total, Length: max 260 mm
Object numbers
Accession number: 1884.140.1740.1 PR no.: 7/ 9058
Research and responses

Information from Accession Book III entry - 15. Wôlo(da) [vide Vol VII Plate XIII] Adze: the blade is generally made from such pieces of iron as the Reel-plate of a boat; the handle usually consists of a L-shaped piece of mangrove wood (Rhizophore conjugata) native name Bada(da)). This tool is used not only in making canoes buckets ... [sic illegible] but in digging graves etc. In former times when iron was scarce Pina and such like shells are said to have been used in forming the blade. Strange to say there is no tradition whatever that stone celts were ever so employed [EH Man 1881]

Associated publications
JAI, 1878: 458 'Adze (Wôlo-da) this is the most common and useful implement used by the Andamanese. With it they make the boats, bows, pails dancing boards etc Pl XIII' [Taken from 'List of Andamanese and Nicobarese Implements Ornaments etc presented to Major-General Lane Fox by EH Man esq and thus described by Mr Man 18th September 1877'. [AP Leverhulme project on founding collection 1995-1998]

Search terms: Tool, Adze

Further items to explore