Page:Shetland Folk-Lore - Spence - 1899.pdf/84

 convex edge, a thickened back, and a projecting tang-like handle. This specimen is 9½ inches in length by 2½ inches across the widest part of the blade. Its surface is ground smooth all over, and the edge is sharpened by grinding from both faces. This variety of implement appears to have been very abundant, though owing to its extreme thinness and consequent fragility it is but seldom that an entire specimen is met with." A fine specimen of the former class of stone knife is in the possession of Mr. Mathewson, Lerwick. It measures 8¾ inches in length by 5½ inches across the broadest part. When it is remembered that these cutting implements were the knives, spokeshaves, and planes of their original owners, it is easy to understand how valuable they were, and with what care they would be fashioned and ground by this early people.

The aborigines made many domestic articles out of clebber, or bairdal, as steatite is also called. There are stone