Page:VCH Surrey 1.djvu/281

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EARLY MAN tools or weapons will be noticed, there are other remains such as traces of dwellings and camps of which it will be necessary presently to speak in some detail. The sharp-edged ground axe or celt which must have been one of the most valuable of the neolithic implements either for peaceable or warlike purposes, and which indicates a great advance upon the tools of the earlier age, has been found pretty evenly, but not plentifully, scat- tered over the surface of the country. Examples of ground celts have been found at the following places in Surrey : Albury, Ash (2), Chertsey, Chipstead, Croydon (3),Egham, Dorking, Elstead, Kingston-on-Thames, Mitcham Common, Purley, Puttenham, Reigate, Titsey, Whitmore Common in Worplesdon parish, and Wisley. This does not profess to be a complete list, but it will serve to indicate the distribution of antiquities of this kind in Surrey. NEOLITHIC FLAKES, REIGATE. It should be added that many examples of ground flint celts of the neolithic age have been procured from the bed of the river Thames near the Surrey shore. The varieties of forms of flint implements shaped by chipping alone are very great, but examples of practically every class have been discovered in Surrey. Perhaps one of the most remarkable collections of flakes, which are the simplest forms of neolithic implements, was found between the years 1848 and 1860 at Redhill near the railway junction. The dis- covery, made by Mr. John Shelley, was communicated to the Society of Antiquaries of London 1 early in 1860 by Mr. (afterwards Sir) John Evans. The flakes were accompanied by numerous cores of flint, from which it is evident that the manufacture of implements was carried on at this spot. 1 Proceedings, ser. 2, i. 69-77. 233