Timeless are pleased to offer a beautiful Stone-Age arrowhead, dating around 6000 years old, mounted on a silver chain.
During the early Medieval period, our Anglo-Saxon forebears believed that the unexplained pains and twinges they experienced (which, now, we might put down to such common ailments as arthritis, rheumatism, or just muscle cramps) were a result of invisible elves shooting arrows at them.
They called the affliction 'Elfshot', believing that the tiny flint arrowheads that they sometimes found in their fields were the cause of these pains, and which could only be cured with either red nettles, feverfew or waybread.
Of course, we now know that the arrowheads had been lying in those Anglo-Saxon fields for thousands of years.
In order to prevent elfshot, our ancestors would wear Stone Age flint arrowheads as charms, a practice which continued well into the 20th century, and resulting in some beautiful amulets like this one found in Scotland.
Mounted in silver (by us, not by the Anglo-Saxons), this particular arrowhead is knapped in flint and is of Saharan African origin.
Now available in the Timeless Galleries
STONE AGE ARROWHEAD MOUNTED IN SILVER
Acquired by Timeless on the UK Mineral and Fossil Market, 2018. Originally of North African provenance.