Bird spear

Bone prong from 3-prong bird spear (nuusaarpak) from the North Arctic. A sample was carbon-dated to the second half of the 17th century, and was identified as coming from a marine animal, perhaps a whale. This bird spear prong from the Arctic is a very unusual find for London and may have been brought back by a 17th- or 18th-century London whaler from the Arctic. The whaling trade had a presence in London with the Muscovy Company (later the Greenland Company) from the early 17th century. The Howland Great Wet Dock constructed 1696-1700 was used increasingly by Greenland Whalers from the 1720s, and was consequently renamed Greenland Dock in 1763 when it changed hands. Deptford Creek, the findspot of the bird spear, is about 2km downstream of Greenland Dock.