These two flint objects are both knives. This type of tool would have been used for cutting, the same as how we use knives now. They are usually longish and have ‘retouch’ along at least one of the long edges. Retouching is when small chips of flint are removed from the edge of a flint item to change the shape or the sharpness of the edge and is usually done with a hammer made of stone or antler.

Knife number 1 probably uses a retouch technique called ‘pressure flaking’. In this technique the flint item isn’t hit with a hammer, but pressure is applied to the edge using a small, narrow piece of antler or bone. This method is more precise than striking with a hammer and it removes longer chips from the tool.

Flint is naturally grey, brown or black in colour. The whitish colour of both knives has been caused by a natural process called ‘cortication’, a surface change that happens after the flint has become buried in the soil. Number 2 has some beige-coloured traces on the surfaces, which look like dirt. However, it’s called ‘race’ and it sometimes builds up naturally on flint because of water in the ground.

1. There is retouch along most of both the long edges and the distal edge (at the top), all on just one face (the flat surface). The retouch is very neat and ‘semi-invasive’, it isn’t just on the very edge but covers more of the surface. This semi-invasive retouch was probably done using pressure flaking. This knife was probably made during the Neolithic (c. 4000-2400 BC) or Early Bronze Age (c. 2400-1500 BC) and was found in a Middle Bronze Age ring ditch.

2. One of the long edges has been retouched in a way which blunts that edge and makes the tool more comfortable to hold, without cutting the hand. The opposite long edge is the cutting edge of the tool and this edge is usually only slightly retouched or unretouched. ‘Backed’ knives were used during the Mesolithic (c. 10000-4000 BC) and Neolithic (c. 4000-2400 BC) periods. This example is probably Neolithic in date as Mesolithic examples tend to be smaller and narrower.