The hieroglyphic system of writing was already complete, and fragments of obsidian vases turned on the lathe indicate commercial relations with the Ægean Sea.
As the nearest source of obsidian to Egypt that is known are the islands of Santorin and Melos in the Ægean Sea, there must have already been a maritime trade with the Greek seas.
These tools, such as knives, razors, lancets, spear and arrow heads, were simply flakes from an obsidian block.
Metal was not much used in making weapons, not being found in swords or arrow-heads, but employed with obsidian in spearheads and on the maza, or club.
Of obsidian were made the knives used in the sacrifice of human victims, and the lancets used in bleeding for medicinal purposes and in drawing blood in the service of the gods.
Thus Las Casas tells us that ten or fifteen obsidian razors were required to shave one man's beard.
Masks and even rings and cups were sometimes worked from obsidian and other kinds of stone.
Obsidian Cliff is the next object of special interest which is witnessed.
From the blade ofobsidian on the table his eye turned to the portrait of a woman in porcelain that hung just over the clock.
The whole region is exceptionally rich in fragmentary and small relics, like pottery, obsidian implements, and terra-cotta heads.
The working of flint or obsidian into arrowpoints or cutting implements is a process by pressure that has not been wholly lost.
They used this excellent material for their arrow-points and spear-heads, and we bought and were given a score or more of very fine specimens of such obsidian points, but found none except some broken ones, during our hurried look.
Small crystals of quartz and of glassy felspar with bits of obsidian (up to 3 mm.
The fragments of rhyolitic glass, intermediate in structure between compact obsidian and pumice, that were imbedded in the pumice-tuffs in one locality, were probably ejected from some sub-aerial vent.
It is, however, remarkable that no compact obsidian came under my notice.
On the route we pass by Obsidian Cliff, sometimes called Obsidian Mountain, which is an immense mass of black volcanic glass.
Summit Pools] Opposite the base of Obsidian Cliff is Beaver Lake, the home of numerous beavers and a great resort for waterfowl during a part of the year.
In the course of excavations at Kuyunjik, when sinking shafts into the lowest stratum just above the level of the plain, I came across obsidianimplements and beds of ashes, indicating the existence of a Neolithic settlement.
The horses groaned as they had to choose, minute by minute, between barking their hocks on the knife-like corners of obsidian or taking the barbs of the cholla.
In all of them, of course, pottery and obsidianwere found.
These are the flakes of obsidian and lava and the painted pottery.
They used flint, but no trace of obsidian is found.
Of the military manufactures of the Pecos, a small arrow-head of obsidianfound near the church is the only trace.
It only reappears in I, opposite the church annexes, and also in the enclosure H, whereas the church grounds are again strewn with handsome pieces, and some of the finest obsidian flakes were found on them.
Pottery and obsidian are ever present, but become perceptibly less and almost disappear further east.
The fact that several localities at Pecos are completely devoid of obsidian has already been mentioned.
Both M and N are scattered over with broken pottery, chips of obsidian and flint, and I also found a fragment of a stone implement.
Stones are scattered about the premises, but I found neither obsidian nor pottery.
Spears, javelins, arrows, heavy war-clubs with jagged pieces of obsidian were hurled upon the Spaniards on the causeway.
The wooden shields did not even blunt the edge of the Toledo blade; the obsidian battle-axes could not contest with the iron maces.
These obsidian knives are likewise represented in one of the early volumes of the French Academy, but Warden does not mention them in his "Antiquites Mexicaines.
We have compared several specimens of flint and obsidian knives, and found them as perfectly alike as if they had been made by the same artist, and as the difference of the material allows.
There is a very remarkable coincidence of these knives with the perfectly similar instruments of obsidian or volcanic glass, which are found, even now, in Mexico, some of which Mr. T.
The industry of Le Grand-Pressigny seems, however, like the obsidiantrade in the Mediterranean, to belong to the closing phases of the neolithic age, while the Graig Llwyd factory may well date from the bronze age.
The obsidian trade of Melos may well be as early as this, in fact it seems to have been on the decline by 3000 /B.
The inhabitants of the island of Santorin, the ancient Melos, had before metal was known organised an export trade in obsidian goods, for they held a monopoly of that excellent volcanic glass in the AEgean region[78].
And in a similar way, by stealing over from Blacktail Deer Creek, they overcame the Undine Falls in Lava Creek and passed its steep obsidian walls, which not all the fishes in the world could climb.
The hard black lava on the glass-like obsidian were changed to white kaolin as soft and powdery as chalk.
They were found in the most ancient sepulchers of the Cyclades, in company with stone weapons, principally arrowheads of obsidian from Milo, and with polished pottery without paintings.
Our people think bad spirits always at war in the earth, so our people scarcely ever went into that country, although our great men fetch obsidian from there to make arrows.
She alone could read the painted rocks and tell their meaning, and could relate the past glories of the tribe and the methods of the arrow makers, who transformed the obsidian into the finished arrows ready to kill the mountain ram.
We were the Sheep Eaters who have passed away, but on those walls are the paint rocks, where our traditions are written on their face, chiseled with obsidian arrow heads.
The brave took another arrow from his quiver and with deliberate aim he drove the arrow with its obsidianshaft into one of the bear's eyes, cutting it entirely out.
Emblems, original with their tribe, were cut with theobsidian arrowhead in irregular semicircles.
In former days they were sharpened by inserting flint or obsidian along the edge.
Their knives and spear-points are made of obsidian and flint.
Previous to the introduction of iron, their spears were pointed with obsidian or some other flinty substance which was hammered and ground to a sharp edge.
Stansbury discovered pieces of broken Indian pottery and obsidian about Salt Lake.
At Ogden River, in Utah, they work obsidian splinters 'into the most beautiful and deadly points, with which they arm the end of their arrows.
In the earlier Mycenaean times the arrow-head of obsidian alone appears," as in Mycenaean Grave IV.
Mycenae and in the later tombs the arrow-head is usually of bronze, though instances of obsidian still occur.
I was a good three hundred yards ahead of my companions when I turned from the road to cross Obsidian Creek to the cabin.
The huntsman fitted the obsidian points to them, and Roger stepped back a hundred yards from the small tree, with a trunk some six inches in diameter, under whose shade they had been sitting.
Bathalda had brought with him a bag of sharp obsidian arrowheads, and some feathers for winging them, together with a bowstring of twice the ordinary strength.
Rust has two brief articles on The Obsidian Blades of California and A Puberty Ceremony of the Mission Indians.
Some of the most important of the regalia, such as long obsidian knives and albino deerskins, are not worn on the body or used ritually but merely carried for display, being primarily objects of great value.
The above list will hopefully give you a few useful examples demonstrating the appropriate usage of "obsidian" in a variety of sentences. We hope that you will now be able to make sentences using this word.
