File:Late Neolithic - Early Bronze Age, Thumb Nail Scraper (FindID 119228-91571).jpg

English: Flint ‘thumbnail’ scraper of probable Late Neolithic or Early Bronze Age date (2500 - 1500 BC). The flint flake is broad and squat being oval in plan and sub-rectangular in cross section. It measures 21.2mm length, 24.9mm width, is 7.6mm thick and weighs 4.08 grams. The flint flake is not well preserved and the bulb of percussion on the reverse face cannot be identified. Evidence for retouch or secondary working can be seen on the front end / edge of the flake; these facets are small neat and regular. Other evidence of secondary working cannot be seen. Both faces of the tool have irregular ‘crazed’ surfaces which are slightly translucent. The cause of this is most likely to be direct heat and rapid cooling. The most common evidence for this is flint waste and discarded tools being used as ‘pot boilers’. As the term suggests this describes a technique common in prehistory for heating water. The use of this flint as a pot boiler would explain the large number of hinge fractures present and the unusually large amount of abrasion. The flint is a mid white colour with a series of deep brown purple veins running through all surfaces. These veins are the results of the small cracks filling with soil. Thumb nail scrapers are seen as being a utility domestic scraping tool; they frequently occur in assemblages dating to the beaker period (Late Neolithic and early Bronze Age.