After pressure flaking the leaf shape arrow head, we went onto making our own knife blades using the techniques we’d been taught that day. The above picture is of Matt’s nettle string, wooden handle made by using flint tools and the flint knife blade that was to be set into the handle.

Chris’ knife being stuck in place using melted wax, the next stage is to use the nettle string to secure the knife in place. Unfortunately I have utterly failed to take any pictures of the end result, but hope to take some pictures and add them later.

This was the end to a thoroughly enjoyable day, where we all learnt so much and had all managed to make a knife as an example of our newly learnt skills to take away with us. For me the workshop has removed a lot of the mystery behind the flint tools and we all left with a greater understanding and appreciation of how these tools were manufactured and of those who had worked the flint into usable tools.

This is the Iron Age round house that we worked near and made a nice backdrop to our lithics activities. For more information on Flag Fen and it’s workshops, go to the links page and follow the link to their website.