Abstract

The literature of the past seventy years relating to battle-axes and axehammers is limited, and relates mainly to the separate publication of individual finds. Sir John Evans, in his classic work, Ancient Stone Implements listed eighty-seven battle-axes from England, Scotland and Wales. R. A. Smith, in 1925, carried out a more detailed survey with emphasis on the associated finds, but drew conclusions about evolution and dating which are untenable according to present archaeological thinking. In 1960, Ashbee briefly delineated five types, making a distinction between ‘axe-hammers’, his Woodhenge and Parcelly Hay groups, and ‘battle-axes’, comprising more evolved implements with connections with the Wessex Culture. In this present survey it is hoped to make good the neglect this subject has suffered, by presenting a corpus of finds which is as complete as possible, together with some considerations on typology, associations, petrology—where details are available—distribution, origins and dating.

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