Middle and Late Bronze Age Metal Tools from the Aegean, Eastern ...

functionality of small, indistinct implements is difficult to interpret, for several crafting
operations required tiny, pointed objects. The evaluation of whether small, slender tools
with narrow points were utilized for textile production, leather working, engraving, or
even writing is impossible in most cases. 43
For this reason, a catch-all category
incorporates those objects whose function is indistinguishable. Awls, small pointed tools,
engravers, styli, double spatulas, punches, and other undefined tool shafts are classified
as items intended for small craft activity, such as those examples cited above.
Carpentry and masonry tools include adzes (single/flat or lugged), axes
(single/flat, shafted, or lugged), double axes, double adzes, ax-adzes, chisels (narrow,
broad, socketed, cold, or mortise), drills, double hammers, hammer-axes, saws, a drawing
compass (uncertain identification), and pick-adzes. Whether these tools were used for
wood- or stone-working defies identification; the same implement type could be
employed variously on either material. Although marks appear on many tool edges, the
assessment of use-wear trends on these implements is problematic without microscopic
metallographic examination.
44
Some tools exhibited scratches that resulted from ill-
conceived conservation attempts rather than actual use. The ancient marks that are visible
were often caused by whetstones that sharpened the cutting edges. Comparative
ethnographic and experimental work is necessary to better appraise the differences
between prehistoric wood- and stone-working copper-alloy tools, particularly on the
cutting edges. As it was impossible to differentiate between objects used on wood and
those used on stone, carpentry and masonry tools were grouped into one category.
Despite the difficulty in discerning between carpentry and masonry tools, these objects
43 For a reinterpretation of Cypriot awl-like implements as styli, see Papasavvas 2003.
44 Evely (1993, xxii) encountered similar problems when attempting to recognize “identifiable patterns of
wear” on metal tools. Use-wear analysis on tools is undertaken, however, by Semenov 1964.
33