Flint cores, Powillimount

A collection of mesolithic cores, blades and waste in white-patinated flint, chert and quartz made over the past three years in fields on Arbigland estate was donated to Dumfries Museum by Mrs Blackett, who lists Powillimount among the places where this material was found.    In an age before metal people used stone to make a sharp edge. The sites where they worked are known as chipping floors, and are sometimes still littered with stone. Some of it is waste, but sometmes broken or lost tools are found. Not all types of stone are suitable for making tools, and the knapper had to choose the raw material carefully. The best stone was of uniform texture and had no cracks or flaws. The hunter gatherers had a good knowledge of the land and they may have visited certain locations to build up reserves of useful rocks.   Flint is probably the best known of these rocks, but in Scotland the supply is small. Beach flint from underwater beds off the Isle of Man is common in Wigtownshire, but it becomes progressively scarcer inland.   An old cliff line relating to the time of higher sea levels surrounds part of the Galloway peninsula, and many mesolithic sites have been recorded here, particularly around Luce Bay. People settled on the high land above the beach, choosing locations with fresh water and setting up camps in sheltered spots slightly back from the cliff edge. Coastal sites have been traced up the Solway as far as Redkirk Point, near Gretna, where a hearth has been dated to 8000 years before the present. Evidence has also been found for later settlements along the modern day coastline.