I have in mind the so called Acheulian hand axes.

She aimed to go for him with the ax she had in her other hand.

Here, ladies and gentlemen, we have the ax of the headsman... and the execution block.

Our learned medico is going to perform one of his operations with an axe.

One is an Acheulean hand axe from half a million years ago of the kind made by Homo erectus.

Now, the sheer numbers of these hand axes shows that they can't have been made for butchering animals.

And there's another difference too, which is the object on the left is made from one substance.

An sik Lim (Republic of Korea), Pusan District Public Prosecutors Office, Pusan City

Same as for a man.

Give me that ax.

All he needed was his ax and his gun and a chance to hew a living out of the forest with his own hands.

These Acheulian hand axes they're named after St. Acheul in France, where finds were made in 19th century have been unearthed in their thousands, scattered across Asia, Europe and Africa, almost everywhere Homo erectus and Homo ergaster roamed.

You gonna do it with an ax?

I suggest you use an axe.

What's the matter?

These upright apes evolved on the African savanna about two million years ago, and they made these splendid hand axes that fit wonderfully into your hands.

It's otherworldly, beautiful.

Hell, you couldn't heft an axe.

Stretching over a million years, the hand axe tradition is the longest artistic tradition in human and proto human history.

But if we look at the fossil record, we see that they made the same hand axe over and over and over again for one million years.

Go back to this image of the axe and the mouse, and ask yourself Who made them and for who?

The sound of it shall go like the serpent for they shall march with an army, and come against her with axes, as wood cutters.

The sound of it shall go like the serpent for they shall march with an army, and come against her with axes, as wood cutters.

The voice thereof shall go like a serpent for they shall march with an army, and come against her with axes, as hewers of wood.

The voice thereof shall go like a serpent for they shall march with an army, and come against her with axes, as hewers of wood.

For the customs of the peoples are vanity for one cuts a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe.

For the customs of the peoples are vanity for one cuts a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman with the axe.

For the customs of the people are vain for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

For the customs of the people are vain for one cutteth a tree out of the forest, the work of the hands of the workman, with the axe.

I couldn't kill you with an ax.

Hatchet murder. Lower East Side tenement.

Get an ax, smear it with blood.

as when a man goes into the forest with his neighbor to chop wood, and his hand fetches a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slips from the handle, and lights on his neighbor, so that he dies he shall flee to one of these cities and live

as when a man goes into the forest with his neighbor to chop wood, and his hand fetches a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slips from the handle, and lights on his neighbor, so that he dies he shall flee to one of these cities and live

As when a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand fetcheth a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve, and lighteth upon his neighbour, that he die he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live

As when a man goeth into the wood with his neighbour to hew wood, and his hand fetcheth a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slippeth from the helve, and lighteth upon his neighbour, that he die he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live

But as one was felling a beam, the axe head fell into the water. Then he cried, and said, Alas, my master! For it was borrowed.

But as one was felling a beam, the axe head fell into the water. Then he cried, and said, Alas, my master! For it was borrowed.

But as one was felling a beam, the axe head fell into the water and he cried, and said, Alas, master! for it was borrowed.

But as one was felling a beam, the axe head fell into the water and he cried, and said, Alas, master! for it was borrowed.

The stone axe was made by someone for himself.

Yes, I remember where the axe is

Yeah? I chopped two toes off that foot with an axe.

I want you to imagine how we got from making objects like this to making objects like this.

Hand axes mark an evolutionary advance in human history tools fashioned to function as what Darwinians call fitness signals that is to say, displays that are performances like the peacock's tail, except that, unlike hair and feathers, the hand axes are consciously cleverly crafted.