MOA-HUNTERS’ ADZE

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29850, 16 June 1962, Page 13

MOA-HUNTERS’ ADZE

Lost Artifact Recovered

The large stone adze found at the moa-bunter Maori site at the mouth of the Heaphy river and later lost in transit to the Canterbury Museum had been found and returned, said the director of the museum (Dr. R. S. Duff) yesterday. The adze was lost on May 16 when a junior member of the expedition was carrying it back in his pack to Christchurch in advance of the main par.y. After a 20-hour journey he arrived at Christchurch to find the adze was not in his pack. He could only sugges: it might have been left at Sr.lhiwter railway station, or in the rail-car between Stillwater and Christchurch. Inquiries through the Stillwater stationmaster and the lost property office at Christchurch met with no success, said Dr. Duff. “However, the railways were very helpful.” The member of the expedition who had been transporting the adze then returned to Stillwater at his own expense but failed to find anything. Meanwhile, unaware that the adze had been lost, the rail-car driver (Mr I. G. Williams) had found it at the Christchurch depot, in rubbish which had been cleared from the luggage compartment of the rail-car. He took it home without attaching much interest to it, but his son Bryan took it to the museum to be inspected. At the museum the adze was identified as the one which bad been lost and the Williams family presented it to the museum. “And we are very grateful to them,” said Dr. Duff. The adze, he said, was a large example of grey argilE.e. It was of a well-known moa-hunter type. About 12 inches tong, it weighed about six lb and was the best specimen of the collection of adzes found by the expedition.