Ornamented blade

The dagger or awl made of a deer or reindeer metatarsal bone was discovered in 1913 in Stolec, the Police district. According to archival information, together with four other objects dated to the Neolithic era, it was found under a mound of fieldstones. The whole collection, together with information about the circumstances of its discovery, was handed over to the Szczecin Gesellschaft für Pommersche Geschichte und Altertumskunde by a landowner from Stoltec, Hans Lenz. The dagger was made by breaking the bone and sharpening one end. The surface was covered with an ornament consisting of two series of short lines (one on each side of a natural longitudinal depression in the bone). The symbolic meaning of the ornament cannot be excluded. Most researchers are inclined to such interpretation. Significantly, part of the decoration was destroyed during repairs to the sharp end. Therefore, it should be assumed that initially, the dagger was much longer, and the ornament covered the whole or almost the whole length of it. During World War II, the dagger was destined for evacuation from the museum building threatened by bombing. Its history in the months immediately preceding the evacuation and the first years after the war is unclear. Eventually, the object was transferred to the Stralsund Museum, and now it is in the collection of the National Museum (Muzeum Narodowe) in Szczecin.

Michał Adamczyk