Some first steps in human progress / by Frederick Starr.

  • Frederick Starr
Date:
[1901]
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Some first steps in human progress / by Frederick Starr. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    end fits into the notch in the block of wood. With the hand the stick is whirled much as a brace and bit are worked, and a spark is soon secured. So much for the different ways in which people, in the past and present, have made fire by the friction of two pieces of wood one against another. The second method of making fire is by percussion. Of course this method of making fire was in use among our ovm ancestors not very long ago, and flints and steels are not so rare but what most people have seen them and know the method of their use. The Fuegians get a spark by striking a flint uith pyrite : pyrite is also used among many of the Indians of North America, as it was among the Romans and the ancient Greeks ; in fact, the word pyrite comes from the Greek word for fire and means fire-stone. Hough says that, to get a spark, the Eskimo places the piece of pyrites on the pad held in the left hand over the cur\-ed forefinger, the large end down and the thumb set in the cup- shaped cavity at the top. The flap of the tinder-pocket is turned back and held on the forefinger under the protecting pad. The flint is held in the right hand, and by a scraping motion little pieces of pyrites at a dull red heat fall down into the tin- der. The pellet that glows is transferred to the pipe or fire, and the flap of the tinder-pocket is turned dowm, seizing to keep the tinder dry and to e.xtinguish it if necessary’. The Alaskans strike ‘ ‘ together two pieces of quartz rubbed with sulphur over some dry grass or moss, strewed wnth feathers where the sulphur falls.” The West .\fricans lay down on their knees by a fire-stone, ‘‘took a little piece of wood in their hands, and threw sand between the stone and the wood, rubbing them so long against one another till the wood began to burn.” In some parts of Southeastern .\sia bamboo splints are struck together to make a spark, and in Burmah bamboo and broken china.
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