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grip.

some older used specimens have saw marks across the face from fire making use. sometimes painted or ochered, engraved etc. utilitarian models are fairly plain affairs.

Actually from the weight it could even be some kind of ironbark.

They were pretty common kit once, even all out of spears and sticks you could still clobber someone very neatly with it. Definitely not something to drop on your toes!

I'll put some dilly bags and boomerangs up tomorrow if I get around to it. I can find our best spear example (no point in posting, it's super slim to start with and basically invisible in a 480px image ) but I'm buggered if I know where we've put the thrower, it's in the Cape York style (ie, the body is formed on the vertical not the horizontal, more like a swordblade) and has some great examples of natural gum, ornamentation (with particularly toxic gijigiji seeds) and biface shell fitting at the handle end. It'll turn up, things always do.

Yknow in movies when someone throws a knife or shoots an arrow at our noble hero and he kind of "slaps" it to one side? Same idea. Though anything hitting it point-on would either stock, deform or pivot around the shield face so it goes past you, rather than into you.

Not a failsafe, one of these in front of you doesn't rule out some cheeky bugger sneaking up on your flank.