CHAPTER VIII
UNUSUAL FORMS IN CHIPPED OBJECTS
We have presented illustrations and brief descriptions of all forms classified by the Nomenclature Committee. There remain numbers of forms which do not fit in any of the divisions. Fig. 140 shows a long, pointed object, half-size. There are two distinct projections at the top; the base is concave. Such an implement would be classed as stemmed or not stemmed according to one’s point of view. But the exaggerated shoulders are the essential features, not the stem.
Fig. 140. (S. 1–2.) Material: dark blue flint. W. P. Agee’s collection. Found near Hope, Arkansas.
Fig. 141. (S. 1–1.) Drill-like object. There are really four barbs, or shoulders. Collection of E. E. Baird, Poplar Bluff, Missouri.
Fig. 142. (S. 1–1.) Collection of Mr. Kendall. This is of expanding stemmed type, yet there is observed on the right side a projection intentionally made. A few such objects have been found, and their purpose must remain problematical.
Fig. 143. (S. 1–1.) This figure is probably a knife. It was found by Mr. J. R. Smith in Rhode Island. It has a notch in the top, a large one in the side, and the cutting edge is beveled, or rather made sharply convex. Mr. Smith sent the specimen for examination. It shows evidence of considerable use. Such an object defies classification.
Fig. 144. (S. 1–2.) Unusual forms from Pennsylvania. H. K. Deisher’s collection, Kutztown, Pennsylvania.
Fig. 145. (S. 1–2.) Very rare form of chipped implement from California. H. K. Deisher’s collection, Kutztown, Pennsylvania.
Fig. 146. (S. 1–1.) Peculiar object from F. Delaney’s collection. Fig. 140 and also Fig. 146 are similar specimens, one from W. P. Agee’s collection, Arkansas, and the other from the cabinet of F. Delaney, Rhode Island. In both these the barbs are purposely exaggerated and made the predominant feature of the specimen. It is easy to theorize that these were worked over from broken forms, which may or may not be the case. Fig. 140, Mr. Agee’s collection, has unusual, long, rounded shoulders, the edges beveled, and the angles are very marked. Both these specimens are interesting; similar ones are not frequently found. The above specimen is of mottled flint and was found in Pulaski County, Kentucky.
Fig. 147. (S. 1–1.) An object (knife) with sloping shoulder, well-defined blade, or cutting edge. Collection of Langdon Gibson, Schenectady, New York.
Fig. 148. (S. 1–2.) The curved knife shown above is from one of the altars of the Hopewell group, and is shown half-size. A number of these barbed knives, made of obsidian, were taken from the Hopewell effigy mound. The material is from Yellowstone Park, and must have been brought over twenty-five hundred miles (by canoe).
Fig. 149. (S. 1–1.) This is from Wisconsin. Such specimens are beautiful examples of high art in chipping. G. L. Collie’s collection, Beloit, Wisconsin. A similar specimen to Fig. 149 is in the collection of Mr. L. Simonton of Warren County, Ohio.
Fig. 150. (S. 1–1.) Black, opaque obsidian with double serration; notched for handle. Very delicate workmanship. Found by James A. Barr at the Stockton Channel mound.
Fig. 152. (S. 1–1.) Unknown form of chipped object. E. E. Baird collection, Poplar Bluff, Missouri.
Fig. 151. (S. 1–3.) “Stockton Curves.” Black obsidian, fine workmanship. James A. Barr’s collection.
Fig. 153. (S. 1–1.) To the right a scraper or knife of finely grained chocolate quartzite. At the left, the upper specimen is a knife of white chalcedony; the lower specimen, gray jasper, assuredly a handled knife, with tang so small that it must have been used on something easy to cut. Possibly a knife for opening fish, as it was found where trout are plentiful. Point broken, cutting edge unusually sharp. Collection of Luther A. Norland, La Jara, Colorado.
In the neighborhood of Stockton, California, are many small mounds and prehistoric sites. Professor James A. Barr and the late Rev. H. C. Meredith spent considerable time in examination. As a result numerous peculiar curved and angular obsidian artifacts were discovered. I present a few views of these in Figs. 150 and 151. In “Prehistoric Implements,” page 362, Professor Barr expresses his opinion that the curves were used to scarify the flesh on ceremonial occasions. This was a universal custom among Indians, particularly the tribes west of the Mississippi and along the Pacific Coast.
Fig. 154. (S. 1–2.) This cut presents peculiar serrated unknown forms from the Fraser River, British Columbia. These were found by Harlan I. Smith.
The peculiar thing is that these curves are confined to the locality of Stockton and do not occur elsewhere. Therefore, my individual theory is that certain skilled workers in obsidian developed or made a specialty of this form. In other words, a peculiar art was developed by a certain clan or group of families, as has been observed in Greene County, Ohio.
Fig. 155. (S. 1–2.) This is a flint chipped in an imitation of a moose antler, and was found by W. H. Davis in Lowell County, Ohio. It is a remarkable specimen.
Regarding the amount of obsidian available for chipping, Professor Barr states: “The great obsidian beds of Lake and Napa counties, which I have examined several times, could furnish all the Indians of the United States with material for generations. The hills are full of great blocks of obsidian, too heavy for a man to handle, and it breaks as straight as a shingle.”
Fig. 156. (S. 1–1.) A fish, a crescent, and possibly a bird, together with highly specialized points in carnelian and moss-agate, found near Arlington, Oregon. The skilled worker was able to make effigies of human beings, as well as of birds and animals, in agate, etc. F. A. Thomas’s collection, California.
I call attention to Fig. 160, from Mr. Reeder’s collection, Michigan. In this plate are seven large flint objects. The spear-head does not differ from other similar kinds of spears, but the flint celt, to the right, is unusually well-shaped and so highly polished that the flake depressions are scarcely visible. To obliterate all traces of chipping must have required a great deal of labor. The round, flat disc at the bottom is very carefully worked, and cannot be classed as unfinished. It is purposely worked in this form. What was the object of the natives in making this, I leave to others.
Fig. 157. (S. 1–9.) In addition to other specimens, this represents four Indian heads, showing both the features and the method of hair-dressing. These are from the collection of J. T. Reeder, Houghton, Michigan, and were collected by him in Tennessee and Kentucky.
The human head shaped out of flint is such as is occasionally found in Tennessee in the stone graves. Some similar heads are shown on a smaller scale, in Fig. 157, of Mr. Reeder’s collection. At the top to the left, in Fig. 160, are two of those problematical forms in flint which have so puzzled archæologists. These, together with the slender dagger-shaped objects of prodigious length, have for many years been listed under that opprobrious name, “ceremonial swords.”
Fig. 158. (S. 2–3.) This illustration represents three animals and four birds, all chipped out of flint, and in the possession of H. M. Braun, East St. Louis, Illinois.
The remarkable problematical forms in flint which have been called “stone swords,” shown in Figs. 161 and 162, deserve special mention. These are part of a series of forty-six flint implements which were found in Tennessee. I surrender the pen to Mr. W. J. Seever, former curator of the Missouri Historical Society Museum, who furnished the following description:—
“On the banks of the beautiful Duck River, Humphreys County, Tennessee, near Painted Rock, on the farm of Mr. Banks Links, are the remains of an extensive, ancient, stone-grave cemetery, which at one time contained hundreds upon hundreds of stone cists. The land having been in cultivation for many years, wagon-loads of flat rocks used in building the graves have been carted off and the human remains scattered; innumerable objects of prehistoric art have been turned up by the plow and are now among the collections of the Ohio Valley.
Fig. 159. (S. about 1–4.) Effigies in flint, from the collection of J. T. Reeder, Houghton, Michigan; from stone graves near Waverly, Tennessee.
Fig. 160. (S. about 1–3.) From John T. Reeder’s collection, Houghton, Michigan. I know of few more remarkable finds in American archæology than this series of flint implements which were collected in Tennessee by Mr. Reeder.
“In December, 1894, an employé of Mr. Links, while plowing in this field, turned up several implements. Their form and size being unusual, time was taken to dig, and the objects as shown in the accompanying illustration were found. According to the words of the finder, they were simply ‘in a bunch’; nothing unusual in the manner of the deposit was noted. The find was talked of and commented upon for several months. The precise spot having been carefully noted, further digging was done in the following March. At a depth of a foot or two below where the flint objects had been deposited, two images or idols were found. Whether the deposits had been associated with human remains, it was impossible to determine. From appearances and accounts of the discovery, the images were placed in the ground side by side, in an upright position, the flints in a compact ‘bunch’ immediately above. On all sides were remains of graves, but so many of these graves having been disturbed and the stones removed in cultivation, that with certainty it cannot be said that the find was a deposit with the dead, although the writer inclines to the opinion that they were and that the stone cist lay immediately above the cache of objects.”
General Thruston says of such forms:—
“The symmetry and beauty of the handle, the exact projections on opposite sides, the tapering forms and the evidently important place these rare objects must have held in the religious and social life of the old Tennesseeans, all invest them with peculiar interest.
“Here we have, in all probability, the sceptres or royal maces once used by the magnates of the race that built the mounds and fortifications of middle Tennessee. They may have been the insignia of chieftainship or of the priesthood.”
I feel confident in asserting that nowhere in the world has the equal of these magnificent flint implements been found. The maker of such forms was a Stone-Age artist of remarkable skill.
Fig. 137 exhibits 39 remarkable chipped objects from Colonel B. H. Young’s collection, Louisville, Kentucky. There are, perhaps, more specialized flint artifacts found in Kentucky and Tennessee than elsewhere in North America. Some of these can be classified, but most of the 39 objects represent individual fancy. The master workman exerted himself to produce unusual types, and being a master at flint-flaking he rounded out his work skillfully and artistically. Readers are requested to examine Fig. 137 with some care.
Fig. 161. (S. about 1–3.)
Chipped problematical forms, from a grave in Tennessee. Missouri Historical Society collection. (See page 164.)
Figures 161 and 162 illustrate problematical forms in flint from a grave in Tennessee. See pages 164–166. Missouri Historical Society collection, St. Louis, Missouri.
These specimens are part of a deposit of forty-six and vary from eight to twenty-two inches in length. The longest one in Fig. 161 is twenty inches. All of them exhibit unusual skill in their manufacture.
Fig. 162.
The same as Fig. 161.
Fig. 163. (S. about 1–3.)
Chipped axes and hoes. F. P. Graves’s collection, Doe Run, Missouri.