If the Indonesians had developed the technique of working bronze on their own, bronze axes would undoubtedly have been found which would have greatly resembied ordinary stone axes in shape. For one can hardly imagine that in so vast an area, once the technical difficulties of metal-working had already been overcome, a sudden deviation would have been made from the traditional shape, and a transition effected to an entirely new shape of axe, and yet one which had the same shape wherever it was found. But the bronze age in the Indonesian archipelago did not apparently produce any rectangular axes in bronze, but only so-called socketed axes, and these most accomplished soketed axes in their manner of execution. The shape of these socketed axes is very different from that of the rectangular axes dating from the stone age. The most essential innovation is that they were fixed to the haft in an entirely different way: for with the socketed axes the halt is inserted into the blade, and not vice versa, as was the case with the stone axes. From this the conclusion must be drawn that the working of bronze did not develop locally, and that the socketed axes were brought to the islands from somewhere else; the technique of bronze casting must have become familiar in Indonesia at the same time.

This cultural innovation also came to the Indonesian archipelago from South-east Asia, in particular from the area of Tonking and northern Annam. Here, close to the village of Deng-Son, such an abundant variety of artifacts has been found that prehistorians regard this area as the cradle of bronze culture throughout South-cast Asia and Indonesia, so that the site of these discoveries has given its name to the whole culture as such.

Certain finds show that the Indonesians were able to give an individual touch of their own to this new addition to their culture - although this was not the case with the socketed axes, which were used in everyday toil, because the shape of this implement was determined by considerations of practical utility, and in this respect the socketed axe could not be surpassed. But there have also been found bronze equivalents to the stone axes mentioned above which were used for ceremonial purposes, and in the case of these 'implements' the function which they performed was completely different: since it was irrational, the shape acquired characteristics of its own.-Although the axes used for ceremonial purposes which have been found in Indonesia correspond to a certain exient with those from Dong-Son, both types being asymmetrical, in the case of the Indonesian axes this asymmetrical is striking, and of Len touches upon the bizarre - in contrast to the axes

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