Page:The Ancient Stone Implements (1897).djvu/256

234 the beach at Pen-maen-mawr. One of the mauls in the Warrington Museum is 6 inches long, and weighs 3 lbs. 14 ozs. One of basalt, measuring nearly a foot in length, was found in ancient workings at Amlwch Parys Mine, in Anglesea. Others have been discovered in old workings in Llangynfelin Mine, Cardiganshire, and at Llanidan, Anglesea.

A ponderous ball of stone, about 5 inches in diameter, probably used in crushing and pounding the ore, a portion of stag's horn, fashioned so as to be suited for the handle of some implement, and an iron pick-axe, were found in some old workings in the Snow Brook Lead Mines, Plinlimmon, Montgomeryshire.

Two of these hammer-stones, 4 and 5 inches in length, were obtained by the late Hon. W. O. Stanley, within hut circles, possibly the remains of the habitations of copper miners in ancient times, at Ty Mawr, in the Island of Holyhead. Some of these mauls are figured in the Archæological Journal, and are of much the same form as Fig. 159, the original of which probably served another purpose. Others of the same character, formed of quartzite, were found at Pen-y-Bonc, Holyhead, and Old Geir, Anglesea. They have also been found at Alderley Edge, Cheshire.

A boulder, like those from Llandudno, but found at Long Low, near Wetton, Staffordshire, is in the Bateman Collection. One from Wigtownshire has been regarded as a weight.

They are of not uncommon occurrence in the south of Ireland, especially in the neigbourhood of Killarney, where, as also in Cork, many of them have been found in ancient mines. They have, in Ireland, been denominated miners' hammers. One of them is engraved in "Flint Chips." I have seen an example from Shetland.

They have also been found in ancient copper mines in the province of Cordova, at Cerro Muriano, Villanueva del Rey, and Milagro, in Spain; in those of Ruy Gomes, in Alemtejo, Portugal; and at the salt mines of Hallstatt, in the Salzkammergut of Austria, and at Mitterberg, near Bischofshofen.

A large hammer of the same class, but with a deeper groove all round, has been recorded from Savoy.

They are not, however, confined to European countries, for similar stone hammers were found by Mr. Bauerman in the old mines of Wady Maghara, which were worked for turquoises (if not also for