D' A. Jones P., Simons E.N. Story of the Saw

Manchester: Spear&Jackson Limited, 1961. —77 p.More than half a million years ago, man took a tremendous step. That step helped to distinguish him forever from the less intelligent and unselfconscious animal world: he began to make hand tools.
Because they were of such great antiquity, many of our familiar hand tools had already attained a late stage of development in classical or medieval times. The very thing that surprises people today when they first see four or five hundred years-old axes, planes, hammers, chisels and saws is that they all look so 'modern'.
The basic principle of sawing was first devised in the pre-metal age. Neolithic man adapted as tool s the objects he found around him; he cut crude and uneven notches or serrations in the edges of flint flakes. The principle of abrasion man understood from his fire-saw or sawing-thong.