"Another recent find from East Timor (island state located about 400 miles northwest of Darwin, Australia) with a surprisingly early date is an edge ground Tridacna shell adze/axe found imbedded in the road surface near the township of Tutuala. A section of the adze was directly AMS dated to 8,600 +- 245 BP."---------2006, Sue O'Connor, Uncovering Southeast Asia's Past, Selected Papers, "Unpacking The Island Southeast Asian Package Neolithic Cultural Package, And Finding Local Complexity," p. 81.
    "Large heavy Tridacna and Hippopus shell adzes are found in Golo Cave on Gebe Island (Indonesia) in levels dating to between 13,000 to 8,000 BP and adzes of comparable age and form have been found in Pamwak Cave in the Admiralty Islands."---2006, Sue O'Connor, Uncovering Southeast Asia's Past, Selected Papers, "Unpacking The Island Southeast Asian Package Neolithic Cultural Package, And Finding Local Complexity," p. 81.
   "In Polynesia the Neolithic adze technology arrived in a well developed form with the first men to settle this Archipelago. There is no progression from simpler Pre-Neolithic forms."---1970, Roger Duff, "Stone Adzes Of South East Asia," p. 7.
     "Tridacna shell adzes were in use on Manus (island, province of Papua New Guinea) on evidence from the Pamwak site 7,000 and possibly up to 10,000 years ago."---2006, Wilhelm G. Solheim II, "Archaeology And Culture In Southeast Asia: Unraveling The Nusantao, p. 122.
    "Duyong Cave, near the Tabon Caves of Palawan's western coast (Philippines) produced a "Neolithic Burial" with four Tridacna shell adzes and two different types of shell ornaments as well as other types of shell tools. The calibrated Carbon 14 date for the burial is 3,675 - 3,015 B.C. and 4,575 - 4,425 B.C. for a nearby fire hearth that also had shell debris associated with it"---2006, Wilhelm G. Solheim II, "Archaeology And Culture In Southeast Asia: Unraveling The Nusantao, p. 120.
    "The giant clam, Tridacna gigas is the largest living bivalve mollusc. "---2010, Wikipedia.

 
TRIDACNA SHELL ADZES
NEOLITHIC
SOUTHEAST ASIA & PACIFIC OCEAN

    Adzes have been used everywhere on the planet for cutting trees and carving wood. In fact, they have been in continuous use for thousands of years. The majority of all prehistoric adzes ever produced were made from stone. But there are exceptions. Especially those made by people who lived in the coastal areas of southeast Asia and islands in the Pacific Ocean. The most unique examples of adzes are the ones made from the shell of giant clams.

      A wide range of different types and sizes of shell was used by ancient cultures who populated the many island in the Pacific Ocean. Shell is a strong material that was used to make jewelry and tools for fishing and cutting wood. The largest and thickest pieces of shell were taken from Tridacna gigas clams and used to make adzes and gouges.

     Tridacna gigas is the largest living bivalve mollusc known. The largest known Tridacna gigas specimen was recorded off the western coast of Sumatra. The two shells weighed 507 pounds (230 kilograms). Its live weight was estimated to be about 551 pounds (250 kilograms). But another unidentified large clam from the Japanese island of Ishigaki weighed 734 pounds (333 kilograms). Its live weight was estimated to have been 750 pounds (340 kilograms).

    Shell adzes have been found in a wide area along the coastal waters of southeast Asia and on islands in the Pacific Ocean. There is a report of a Tridacna shell adze from a small island in the China Sea as far north as the People's Republic of China. But they are widely reported from the regions in the Pacific Ocean that make up the island groups of Micronesia, Melanesia and Polynesia.

     Some sites have produced shell adzes that are suspected to be quite old. Solheim writes that, "Tridacna shell adzes were in use on Manus (Island Province, Papua New Guinea) on evidence from the Pamwak site 7,000 and possibly up to 10,000 years ago." Another site at Duyong Cave in the Philippines produced a Neolithic burial with four Tridacna shell adzes. The Carbon 14 date for the burial is 3,675 to 3,015 B.C. and 4,575 to 4,4425 B.C. for a nearby fire hearth that also had shell debris with it. But shell adzes were in use up to European contact.

      Shell adzes are very efficient tools for cutting wood as some early witnesses reported from their travels to Pacific island locations. One account written in the 1800's wrote, "I noticed a large canoe being shaped by two or three workers with their sharp Tridacna shell adzes.----I saw they were going at it fairly rapidly; each blow of the shell adze sent fairly large chips of wood flying."

      There are two locations on a giant clam that produces the largest pieces of shell. One is at the hinge and the other is at the ribs. Sections cut from these locations provide the thickest pieces of shell and the largest adzes.

     Shell adzes were made by percussion flaking and grinding. A piece of shell was extracted from the main shell by either direct percussion flaking or possibly by sticking against an anvil underneath as in bipolar percussion flaking. The final shaping and finishing work was done by either grinding the shell against a wet abrasive surface such as sandstone or by grinding against loose wet sand placed on a hard surface.

     People have always taken advantage of their local natural resources to provide themselves with shelter, food, clothing and tools. Some of those materials seem "exotic" to us today but to the people using them it was a perfect symbiosis. As an example, the mammoth bone house structures made during the Paleolithic period in the Czech Republic, Poland and the Ukraine certainly are impressive and also seem very "exotic." But shell adzes made from pieces cut from Tridacna shells weighing hundreds of pounds have to be one of the most unique materials ever used to manufacture a wood cutting tool.

"REFERENCES"

1970, Duff, Roger, "Stone Adzes Of South East Asia," p. 7.
2006, O'Connor, Sue, Uncovering Southeast Asia's Past, Selected Papers, "Unpacking The Island Southeast Asian Package Neolithic Cultural Package, And Finding Local Complexity," p. 81.
2006, Solheim II, Wilhelm G., "Archaeology And Culture In Southeast Asia: Unraveling The Nusantao, pp. 120 & 122.

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