Two months ago I was given the chance to record a truly striking object, a late Neolithic to Early Bronze Age Axehammer, dating from circa 2,500 BC – 1,800 BC. This was an exciting object to record as I had never seen one before, they are a relatively rare object as only 19 of them have been recorded on the database since its inception.  The object has been formed of a fine grained sandstone, although an expert identification of the stone has yet to be done. The axehammer is triangular in shape and the sides are convex. The hammer end is narrow and the widest point is at the blade side of a hole. The hole has been drilled through the object from both sides, giving it an hour glass shaped appearance. The blade of the axehammer is blunted and angular. Given the typology of this axehammer it can be fitted into Roe’s (1979) class II which is typified by concave sides, this class has been further split between those objects with greater thickness at the blade (a) and greater thickness at the butt (b), this object can be fitted in with class IIb as the greater thickness is at the butt in this example.

Although the function of these objects is not yet fully understood, there does appear to be clear distinctions between these objects and battle axes of the same period, these axehammers appear to be cruder in design. They are also heavy and are not likely to have been traded or carried over great distances. It is possible that these objects may have been used in agriculture, for example as a plough or for breaking ground, they may have also been used in mining. However more research needs to be done on these objects to bring our understanding in line with more modern discoveries.

Axehammers as an object have been used for centuries and are still used today in one form or another, they have also been depicted in mythology especially with the Viking God Thor and his Hammer Mjolnir. It has become synonymous with the thunderbolt, depictions of Mjolnir in amulet and artistic form have a stylistic similarity to this style of axehammer despite being separated by centuries.

There have been a number of similar finds in East Anglia and Yorkshire but an emphasis for distribution can be seen in Western Britain and especially around Dumfries, which may have been an area of importance for these objects, according to Roe (1979).

This was a lovely and rare find to record and caused much excitement in the office when it was brought in. Is it possible that this object is the first evidence of The Avengers?! We will let you decide!

Reference:

Roe, F.E.S., (1979) Typology of stone implements with shaftholes, in Clough, T. H. McK, and Cummins, W. A. (ed) (1979) Stone Axe Studies: Archaeological, Petrological, Experimental and Ethnographic. CBA Research Report, No 23, pp. 23-40; pp 41-48.