At a later period larger rubbers of the same kind were used to smooth the flutings of Doric columns. I have seen some among the ruins of the temples at Selinunto, in Sicily.
Some long narrow rubbers, apparently intended for grinding out the shaft-holes of perforated axes, have been found in the Swiss Lake-dwellings; and I have a slightly conical stone, about an inch in diameter, from Mainz, which may have been used for the same purpose.
In the barrow at Cowlam, already mentioned, besides the grinding-stones of grit, there was a piece of flint roughly chipped into a cubical form, and having one face partly ground smooth. It may have been used for polishing the surfaces of other stone implements, or possibly merely as a muller. It is shown in Fig. 184. The striæ run diagonally of the square face.
In the collection formed by Canon Greenwell, is also a sandstone pebble, 2 1∕2 inches in diameter, which has been “picked” into shape, and has one face smooth as if used for grinding. It was found in a barrow on Ganton Wold, East Riding. A roughly conical piece of oolitic sandstone, 2 1∕2 inches high, in places “picked” on the surface, and with the base apparently used for grinding, was found with a contracted body and some flint flakes, in another barrow on Ganton Wold.[1106]
In the Wiltshire barrows several rubbing-stones (or what appear to be such) of a peculiar form have been found, of which one is shown in Fig. 185. It is of close-grained grit, possibly from the Lower Greensand, and was discovered with two others in a harrow on Normanton Down, near Amesbury. Two more were in the collection of the late Rev. Edward Duke, of Lake, near Salisbury, to whose kindness I am indebted for the loan of the specimen. Both are now in the British Museum. These instruments vary but little in shape, size, or character, being usually of a truncated half-ovoid form, with a rounded groove along the flat surface, and are formed of sandstone.
One was found in a barrow at Upton Lovel,[1107] with flint celts, a perforated stone axe-head, various implements of bone, a bronze pin or |268| awl, and other objects. Another occurred in a barrow at Everley,[1108] with a bronze chisel, an unused whetstone of freestone, and a hone of bluish colour; and another with a skeleton, a stone hammer, a bronze celt, a bone tube, and various other articles in a barrow at Wilsford.[1109] Two or three of these sharpening stones, found in a barrow at Roundway, near Devizes, are in the Museum of the Wilts Archæological Society. One of these has been figured.[1110] A pebble with shallow grooves on each face found at Mount Caburn, Lewes,[1111] may possibly belong to this class of implements, though it may have been a hammer. A rubbing-stone of this kind was found at Topcliffe,[1112] Yorkshire, but not in a barrow.