Originally published Sept. 24, 1975

During the recent Boy Scout Camporee at the Y Beach in Clemson, one boy in Johnny Cutchens Troup said to me, “Mr. McCravy, you haven’t given us any Indian stories in a long time.”

True, we have had many other things to bring you in this column, but Indian history, legends and lore are equally important.

Today we wish to talk about the Celt, as it was the most useful stone tool used by the Indians of all tribes.

The Celt is a flat stone with a sharpened edge. Its uses are varied and many. It can be used as a knife, a scrapper, a chipper, or a hoe. The sharp edge is made by rubbing the stone against another. Usually the women and children did this as they stayed close to camp and had time to sharpen them.

They would grind both edges against another large stone (usually flint) until the Celt became sharp. It was then fastened to a bent tree limb with leather straps, the limb becoming the handle of the tool.

The valuable instrument was used to courier the hair off hides after they were soaked in a solution of wood ashes and powdered wood bark.

Another use was to scrape the fat from bear hides and to scrape tallow from deer skins, fat being used to fry wild turkey eggs on flat soapstone. Fat was also used with wood ashes and ground Indian corn to make pone bread and stick bread.

An important use of the Celt was to chip out the charcoal when making a dugout boat. The tree log was burned on one side, and as charcoal was formed, it was chipped out. Finally the log became a dugout canoe or boat.

The Celt could be used to dig a trench to allow water to drain. It was also useful in digging out a hole back in a bank which was used to store tobacco for it to age and mellow.

But the most important use of the Celt was as a hoe in the cultivation of Indian corn in river bottoms.

Weeds were chopped down with it and the earth dug up. The corn rows crossed much like a checker board with a fish put in each row cross for fertilizer. If a corn grain failed to germinate, a pumpkin or bean stalk or squash was planted in the skip.

The Celt was sometimes used as a wedge in splitting in a log or in stripping bark. In reality, the Celt is a kind of an ax.

In case of an emergency, the celt became an excellent weapon, and was just as effective as a tomahawk.