Collection Bites are a series of short talks put on at Manchester Museum once a month. Featuring a range of experts from different areas of the museum they share their knowledge over a lunch time slot to a small group. The talk usually features some objects from the collection, giving the public a chance to get up close and even handle some of these precious artifacts allowing a bit more in depth focusing on one or two things in particular. Today's objects were stone age tools presented by Museum director Nick Merriman.
Gripping the ancient axe it was amazing to fit my finger tips into the purposely made grooves, and I happened to be wearing a pair of my "Hewn Rings" which were originally inspired by the contrast of worked surfaces with rugged edges found in objects like these.
Pieces of the flint were carefully chipped off by hand to create sharp edges
Victorian enthusiasts collected whole flint rocks believed to be the predecessors of the hand sculpted tools. The lack of evidence for them means they are now just kept as curios.
More info on the next Collection Bites can be found here.
The "bulb of percussion" shows a piece of flint was worked rather than weathered.
blades were carefully made for hand held scrapers and implements to be hafted onto wooden shafts