Last month, we took a look at some uncommon artifacts that are found on historic archaeological sites. This month we are going to take a look at some of the different types of artifacts that are found on precontact sites that we think are very exciting. Archaeologists are mostly likely to find lithic tools such as projectile points and their associated fragments like flakes and shatter, or Native American pottery if the site is from a more recent time, the Woodland period. But while these are the most common artifacts found on precontact archaeological sites, there are many different kinds of tools which are often found at specialized site which give archaeologists an insight into what activities were performed at these locations. Lets take a look at some of the examples which are held here at the State Museum!
Precontact Fish Hooks
Precontact Fish Hooks found in Pennsylvania. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
Perhaps the most essential tool in an angler’s kit, the fishing hook has been around for centuries. The State Museum’s holdings contain examples of carved bone hooks from prehistoric sites in at least a half a dozen counties across the state including Greene, Centre and Fayette, among others. The five specimens seen here were all excavated from the Schultz site (36LA7) in Lancaster County. In rare instances where a high degree of organic preservation has taken place, fragments of cordage used to make fishing nets have been recovered, such as those from Sheep Rock Shelter in Huntingdon County, which unfortunately is now submerged under a lake.
While fish stories both new and old abound, it’s no fish tale to say these surviving artifacts and others, like the more commonly found chipped stone net sinker, speak to the longstanding and influential role riverine and aquatic resources have played in shaping subsistence strategies, settlement patterns, and more broadly, aspects of cultural identity.
Quarry Picks
A collection of quarry picks and steatite bowls from the State Museum Collection. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
This unique artifact type is principally found on Susquehanna and Delaware Valley sites of the Transitional Broad Spear Tradition circa 3500-4000 years ago. In terms of function, stone picks were prehistoric mining implements used to extract blocks of steatite from outcrops found in the east-central Piedmont region of southeastern Pennsylvania. Once quarried, the blocks of steatite, also known as soapstone because of the material’s slippery feel when handled, were carved into stone bowls and other utilitarian containers used in boiling liquids and cooking food.
Stone picks, shown here, were made from hard resistant lithic materials like diabase, hornfels and basalt, also local to the Piedmont region. These crudely made bifacially formed tools usually have an elongated shape 11 – 20 centimeters in length and possess a blunt or nearly rounded poll. The opposite end normally tapers to a point or bit which acts as the tool’s working edge used to carve and shape the soft blocks of steatite into finished bowls and other items. Upon close examination the working or tapered end on these tools is characterized as chisel-like, a part of the tool that had to be intentionally sharpened with an abrasive honestone of gritty gneiss or sandstone. Rarely were stone picks bi-bitted although one example in our collection has a bit point on each of its ends. Many of the steatite containers in the State Museum of Pennsylvania retain the residual chisel-like scars of the stone pick. Most often these scars form parallel discontinuous grooves on the exterior and basal portions of the bowl. Rarely are the telltale grooves evident on the bowl’s interior face where the scars were apparently scraped smooth during the final production stage.
A steatite bowl with the bottom ground out. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
Certainly, the quarry pick was a crude tool aesthetically, but it was also an important element of the Transitional Broad Spear Period tool kit. It was an implement used to make other implements, that in turn, supported a cooking technology new to the region that accommodated an improved way of life well before the development of ceramic containers at the onset of the Woodland period about 3000 years ago.
Antler Flakers
A collection of antler flakers from the State Museum Collection. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
Among the essential materials utilized by Native American cultures for making tools for daily use were the horns from deer, elk and other cervids living around them. Much of this material, better known as antler was worked and shaped by carving, scraping, grinding and smoothing with stone tools and in more recent times with tools of iron such as axes, knives and other similar items obtained through trade with Europeans after their arrival in the New World. Many of these objects are found in the material record when archaeologists investigate Native American habitation sites through careful excavation.
In Pennsylvania and other parts of eastern North America some of these antler objects were used to make something else – in a manner of speaking, tools to make tools. Examples of this are the so called “antler flakers” used to knap arrowheads and other stone tools. These unique tools are remarkably uniform in shape and size from region to region. Antler flakers, however, vanish from the archaeological record by the mid-1630’s when their utility becomes obsolete due to new innovations in Native American tool kits.
Diagram of free-hand pressure chipping. Schumacher, 1877.
For comparison, data from three cultural regions around the Finger Lakes of New York and, the lower Susquehanna of southcentral Pennsylvania were used that provide us with some interesting insight on antler flakers. During the early to mid-sixteenth century antler flakers show up on early proto-Mohawk sites located in the Mohawk valley of eastern New York. There, three sites, Garoga, Klock, and Smith-Pagerie yielded ten antler flakers, a small number when compared to compilations from other sites (Funk and Kuhn, 2003). At a fourth Mohawk site, the Rice’s Woods site dated to the AD 1580 -1614 period, six additional antler flakers were found all sharing similar morphological attributes (Snow, 1995).
Within the Seneca sequence (Wray, 1973) antler flakers have been found at five early proto-historic Iroquois sites where they are apparently common, in fact, quite common (Wray et al. 1987; 1991; 2001). At the Adams, Tram and Cameron sites, Seneca settlements occupied in the late 16th to possibly the earliest decades of the 17th century, the morphology of antler flakers mirror that which is found in the Mohawk data, albeit present in greater frequency. These variations in the data might best be explained by differences in the provenience data of the two regions (ie. middens vs. cemeteries).
Bone chipping implement. Murdoch, 1892.
In the lower Susquehanna valley, antler flaker data from the Susquehannock occupations at Schultz and Washington Boro village sites show a similar chronological pattern when comparisons are made with the New York sites, especially Seneca and the later Rice’s Woods Mohawk site. Excavations conducted at the Schultz and Washington Boro sites in the early 1930’s (Cadzow, 1936) and again at Washington Boro in the early 1950’s (Witthoft nd.) followed again at Schultz in the 1970’s (Smith 1970; Casselberry 1971; Kent 1984) provide us with the largest sample of antler flakers for Susquehannock. For villages of the lower Susquehanna valley the majority of these tools were found in the middens and trash pits of the longhouses and near the palisades where the Susquehannocks would go to build their settlements.
Why do antler flakers disappear from the archaeological record around the beginning of the 17th century? The reason simply may be the change in tool technologies of the Native Americans at that time. With the infusion of European trade kettles beginning around AD 1615-1625 stone arrowheads were rapidly being replaced with metal tipped arrow heads fashioned from cut kettle scraps made in the shape of their stone age predecessor. These small bit lethal weapon tips begin to turn up at the beginning of the 17th century. By the second to third decade of the 17th century metal arrow points are extremely common on all Iroquoian sites. By the third decade of the 17th century a few sites begin to yield evidence of guns which were beginning to be introduced into the native material culture in exchange for furs and other desired commodities. By the 1640’s (post Washington Boro Period) guns were largely the preferred weapon of choice of the Native American. Eventually bow and arrow technology was replaced by these new inventions which negated the need for the antler flaker.
Grooved and Multi-grooved Stones
Grooved and Multi-grooved stones. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
Multi-grooved stones of various sizes and shapes have been found on Late Woodland and early Contact period sites in Pennsylvania and throughout the East. Although several hypotheses have been proposed, there is no agreement as to their function. These objects are thought to be involved in abrading, honing and sharpening although it is not clear as to the kinds of material that were being abraded, honed or sharpened.
An arrow shaft polisher found in a stream in Pennsylvania. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
With the exception of the large Susquehannock arrow shaft polishers in Pennsylvania, these grooved and multi-grooved stones were small, handheld and easily carried tools (Witthoft, 1959). Most often multi-grooved stones were made from cobbles of siltstone and fine-grained sandstone that were readily gathered from nearby stream beds. One exceptional example in the State Museum collections is a small celt of granite that has numerous multi-directional grooves on its long axis, many of which are extremely well worn and somewhat polished. One might conclude from these observations that such grooves were formed by repeatedly drawing strips of dried rawhide over the stone’s surface. The process would easily render sun cured leather into a more acceptable material from which to make clothing. A similar procedure may also have been used to process plant fibers to make cordage, rope etc..
An archaeologist experiments with flint-knapping techniques, creating a grooved stone. Image from the State Museum of Pennsylvania.
On specimens where the grooves are more multi-directional than parallel, and appear more abraded and battered than smoothed and polished, their function is likely related to making stone tools. Using these tools, it was possible for the flint knapper to prepare and/or roughen the margins of a biface, thereby allowing for successful removal of additional flakes when making an arrowhead or re-sharpening one.
We hope you have enjoyed this glimpse of the small and often missed or unknown artifacts that archaeologists find on precontact archaeological sites. These are only some of the beautiful examples that have been recovered from excavations in the state of Pennsylvania. These small artifacts are examples of an object that many would perhaps overlook in the field and find insignificant, thus missing the larger picture of the people who used these objects in their daily life. Preserving the archaeological record includes all evidence from the past and reflects our cultural heritage. Please help us in continuing to preserve and protect the archaeological record.
TWIPA Connection
This blog post is a synthesis of multiple posts previously published on the “This Week in Pennsylvania Archaeology” blog. These posts were originally published on May 21st 2010, and July 23rd 2010, December 3rd 2010 and February 18th 2011. The content has been revised and summarized for clarity. Modifications may include editing, removal or addition of text or the removal or addition of images.
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