Although ishi-bocho means a knife made of stone in Japanese, it was not used for the cooking of fish, meat and vegetable, and it is believed that the tool was used to cut off the rice ear from rice in the time of rice harvesting.
包丁と名はついてはいるが、一般に魚や肉・野菜の調理に用いられた訳ではなく、米の収穫時にイネから稲穂の部分だけを切り取るために使ったものと考えられている。