Ancient Meols. 7
Tweezers, Rivets And Nails
There is no doubt that the ancient Saxons used tweezers extensively; and, when the process of shaving was difficult, such articles were frequently very convenient -- OUCH! Tweezers are more usually found in connection with mortury urns than with body burial; and, in graves of the latter kind, the greater number have been found in connection with the remains of women. Several have been found in the Kentish graves; also at Fairford, Chesel, and Little Wilbraham; and in other countries in Europe as well as in our own. The form was not very varied, Sometimes a single slip of metal was bent into the required shape and some times the two sides were retained by a ring.
At Long Wittenham, in Berkshire, tweezers were almost invariably been found whth the remains of women, only one pair having been found with the remains of a man. These were located at the waist, near the iron ferrule of a spear, and a knife.
In the summer of 1860, anothr pair of bronze, very small, was found in an urn, with calcined human bones, and some other matallic objects. A broad and interesting pair of tweezers was found at Kingston Down, in Kent, and they are commonly found in the graves of North Germany. They were often accompanied by a small knife or by a needle and awl of bronze. In that historical book ANTIQUA EXPLORATA, a curious pair of tweezers is strung with an ear-pick; a small band of wire, instead of a metal runner, surrounds the two sides, and increases the prehensile power of the implement; and others were found ina Saxon cemetery of Linton Heath, Cambridgeshire.
We know that the American Indians and others exhibited the desire for depilatory performance; and depilatories were common not only in Paris but also in London in the 1850's. It was said by some, however, that these instruments were not used for this purpose at all, or at least not exclusively; but that they were employed in sewing. It is supposed that they held together the two sides of the seam, like clamps or wooden forceps, which a shoemaker would have used at that time, to hold two pieces of leather in their position.
Rivets
In the pre-christian period, vast numbers of rivets of a very minute kind were used in the construction of brazen implements, many hundreds being required, at times, for the construction of a single one. These may be seen in connection with brazen trumpets preserved in the National Museum of Ireland once the Royal Irish Academy; but the commoner rivets in 1850 were invented in Germany, to hold on the overlapping plates of armour.
Nails
All nails of the olden times were of wrought iron, the processes for their rapid manufacture was not known and to my knowledge is not known recently. If it can be established I would be greatly pleased to know.
I explained in latter writings that metal detector users frequently recover what is known as Colonial nails. These were of iron, being of various sizes according to their use. The type I have in my collection vary from four to eight inches in length, large square heads, the stem tapering very sharply and inwardly to one third from the head. Often they are clenched at the distant to the head, seeming as if it being driven into timber and turned to hold it into place.
Roman nails have been found at Uriconium, in the very tiles, which were attached to the roofs; and, in like manner, flat-headed nails have been recovered in Caerwent in the tiles for roofing, and elswhere, of the same type as those discovered in the later British barrows. Numerous long spike-nails have been found in various parts of England, as at Lullsworth in 1516, at Colchester, at Bourne Park near Canterbury, at Boxmoor in Herts, and elswhere.
Some supposed that these wre used to fasten together the large boxes in which men were intered, and their goods along with them, other said that that they held together the logs of funeral piles; but an opinion, which is strongly held by others, is, that the Roman punishmentof crucifixion was common in Britain, and that these nails which attached the malefactor to the cross.
In the early part of the eleventh century, workmen at Verulamium found certain oak planks with nails in them, and covered with pitch; they were supposed to be part of an ancient ship. Large Norman nails still remain in several of our church doors, and smaller ones, in the Norman Cathedral.
About 1853, two nails were shown from the door of the Ancient chapel at Kilbride, near Dunblane, whether or not they are still visible I cannot say and more recently to his date, in taking down an old house at Annan, it was found that the slates had been fastened on by pegs made of leg-bones of sheep.
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