Flint Implements in Cornwall

Abstract

My first paper on flint implements in Cornwall dealt with those of Booby Bay and Dinas Head, adjoining Trevose Head, near the famous cemetery at Harlyn Bay. Mention was made of the fact that prisms and cones of regular shape, and long thin flakes, occur there, and also at the inland site on the shore of Dozmare Pool. In both cases, pygmy flints are found with the flakes and cores. On the coast sites, however, scrapers are rare (at Booby Bay they are absent); whilst at Dozmare Pool they are numerous. They are both short and long at this site. The latter are sometimes formed on quite narrow blades. The facets are almost always grey. On the coast the chipped flints are sometimes grey, but are more often white, owing to exposure by the weathering away of the superincumbent soil.Both on the coast sites and at Dozmare Pool the flint tools are made from shore pebbles. Local ideas sometimes attribute the presence of these pebbles on the shore to the casting out of ballast from coasting ships. It is evident that they are in reality remains from the Tertiary beds of West Cornwall, which have now almost vanished, though a section may still be seen near S. Erth.