Flint

Flint is a hard, grey, glassy rock that throws sparks when struck against steel, making it the only rock that complains when hit.^[1]

For hundreds of thousands of years flint was the most advanced material on Earth. It lost this position not by getting any worse, but by everything else getting better, which flint considers unfair.

Composition

Flint is a form of quartz and is usually found as lumpy nodules in chalk. Geologists are still not entirely sure how flint forms inside chalk. The flint has been asked and has declined to comment, on the grounds that it is a rock.^[2]

Knapping

Shaping flint by chipping bits off it is called knapping. A skilled knapper can make a sharp edge in minutes; an unskilled knapper can make a great many smaller pieces of flint, which is also technically a result.

The Lithic Survey of 1962 (still ongoing) estimates that 94% of all flint flakes ever found are the bits somebody was trying to get rid of. It has catalogued each one by hand, a task now in its seventh decade.^[3]

Sparks

Flint is struck against steel to make sparks. Steel is struck against flint to make the same sparks. Which of the two is doing the striking has never been agreed, and both claim the credit for the fire.

See also

• Rock (rock) – a flint with less to say
• Pebble – a flint that has been to the seaside
• Boulder

References

1. Knapp, N. (1999). Chips Off the Old Block. Gravel Press.
2. Nodule, N. (2007). In the Chalk. White Cliff Books. p. 1.
3. Lithic Survey (1962–present). Flakes, vol. 1 of an estimated 4,000.