This really nice FULL GROOVE AXE came from Howard Co Missouri. It is made from a beautiful Hardstone material. It has excellent overall use polish, especially near the bit and in the groove. This is a very fine collectible Axe and will look great displayed with others of its type. This relic was nice enough to be put in our Web Museum where it will be displayed for the foreseeable future. We did this as a way to preserve the history of this artifact and create an accurate provenance for the artifact you purchased.
 
Axes, Celts, Bannerstones, Adzes, and most hardstone (non chert) artifacts are manufactured by an ancient procedure called pecking and grinding. A suitable size stone was picked out with attention to quality, absence of natural or weather related fractures. It would have been picked out for its hardness, workability, and size. Then, the stone is rough shaped by percussion with another stone or, if the stone was close to the intended form, pecking would be first choice of reduction. After the overall surface imperfections are pecked out, grinding would be next to smooth the high areas to a flat surface. This process was repeated many times to get the desired result. The final step in some cases was polishing. Some artifacts were polished simply from use wear and others were intentionally polished when they were made. 
 
 Size 4.26 inches in length.  AX3
        2.94 inches tall.
        1.58 inches wide.