Notice of a peculiar weapon or harpoon of bronze found on the bank of the River Tweed, near Norham / by John Alexander Smith.

Date:
[1870?]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Notice of a peculiar weapon or harpoon of bronze found on the bank of the River Tweed, near Norham / by John Alexander Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    used in the deeper water off the mouths of rivers, when the t^vo heads double the chances of hitting a fish at one stroke. The single-headed spear is used in the shallow water in rivers. The spear head is made of elk bone, glazed with resin, and becomes detached from the spear on the fish being struck, but remains fastened to the line. The fisherman lays the spear down in the canoe, and hauls in the fish with the line. If he sabnon is very large and troublesome, a few small bladders are tied to he line, as near to the fish as possible, and he is left to weary hnnseU by the effort of dragging these under the water. In the rivers and mountain sms in ;Sich the water generaUy is shallow and ^ows rap.cUy, the natives place stones across the channel, and with the smgle-headed spea strike the fish as they pass. It is a pretty sight to see an Indian, wrt his blue blanket flung carelessly around him, standing on these stones in a graceful attitude, poising his long spear, &c. (P. ^-^1.) These salmon spears are, therefore, made to act exactly on the same prmciple as the harpoon of the Esquimaux. ' Mr Sproat has been kind enough to send to me, througli Dr Robert Brown, some clever sketches in water colours, by a ^ (^^)' of various Vancouver Indian weapons, implements, &c. (which I exhibit), including the salmon spears (copied in the annexed woodcut) The ancient spear Lads of bone found in the caves of D^dogn^ with their posterior terminations tapered like the bronze ^-apon, weie ;obably used in a similar manner to those of Vancouver Island, as spear head, found on the banks of the Tweed, J^ L,oon.ke for spearing salmon, or for other — o a much larger size and belongmg to a different zoological Class, it is ot TasY to say • probably it was used for both. It certainly looks considerab y r^ertra™ that at an earlier time the salmon of our rivers may have been at once and may have also lived to reach a iniich larger average size, than their sorely P-^-^^^^^^ ancient TliPTft 13 however, a great similarity oi uc&jf, Thn bronze liko tVn, it, 1,a,b», a,„i a lapcnng pa,tenor ,.xtrom,ty (tlu