handstone

English

Etymology

From hand +‎ stone.

Noun

handstone (plural handstones)

1. A mano.
   • 1997, Kathleen O'Neal Gear, W. Michael Gear, People of the Silence: A Novel of North America's Forgotten Past, →ISBN:

     Cornsilk slammed her handstone down into the meal.

   • 2006, W. Michael Gear, Kathleen O'Neal Gear, People of the Moon: A Novel of North America's Forgotten Past, →ISBN:

     With each stroke she pressed the handstone down over the corn.

   • 2007, Richard Jamison, Linda Jamison, Primitive Skills and Crafts, →ISBN:

     To my surprise it turned out to be a broken half of a well-crafted Indian mano, or handstone.

   • 2014, Lewis Dartnell, The Knowledge: How to Rebuild our World from Scratch, →ISBN, page 84:

     The simplest method is to place a handful of grain on a smooth, flat rock on the ground, and then lean forward and use your body weight to crush and grind it beneath a handstone.

2. Any of various other handheld stone tools.
   • 1891, Proceedings of the Royal Irish Academy - Volume 1, page 218:

     I believe if we refer to these poems that the accounts before us of a stone implement called the champion handstone, Leacan Laoich Milidh and Lia Lamha Laich, will closely tally with this object.

   • 1897, Sir Bertram Coghill Alan Windle, Life in Early Britain:

     In the record of the Ford of Comar, near Fore, in the county of Westmeath, which is supposed to have occrred in the century before the Christian era, Lohar's people all came with a champion's handstone stowed away in the hollow of their shields.

   • 1948 October, “Sharpening Axes”, in Popular Science, volume 153, number 4, page 237:

     Each time the axe is used, hone or touch up the edge with a handstone.

   • 2010, Jeffrey R. Ferguson, Designing Experimental Research in Archaeology, →ISBN:

     The ease with which the handstone moves across the hide depends on the amount of connective tissue and moisture on the hide.

See also

• Handstein

Anagrams

• nondeaths