The stone age in North America, vol. 1 of 2 — John Shaqi
The stone age in North America, vol. 1 of 2Moorehead, Warren K. (Warren King)
History
The stone age in North America, vol. 1 of 2
Moorehead, Warren K. (Warren King)
Indians of North America -- Antiquities; Stone age -- North America
the observations cited above, I cannot believe that the quarries
represent the work of aboriginal man during a few generations, but that
they indicate, perhaps, three or four thousand years of occupation. Dr.
W. C. Barnard, of Seneca, Missouri, has given the subject much study. He
contributes his observation as follows:—
[Illustration:
FIG. 36. (S. 1–3 to 1–6.) Rejects from rhyolite quarried from the
mass, in upper row. Rejects from jasper quarried from the mass, in
lower row.
]
“Prehistoric man of this region [the Ozarks] secured his principal
supply of flint from boulders and pebbles found in the beds of
water-courses as evinced by the character of the material found in
hundreds of workshops along the banks of streams. All the more primitive
implements are of this boulder and pebble material.
[Illustration:
FIG. 37. (S. 1–3 to 1–6.) This figure is a portion of Professor
Holmes’s plate, chap. 1 (15th _Annual Report_, Bureau of Ethnology),
which for convenience I have divided. It carries to complete form
the specimens shown in Fig. 36. Numbers 7, 8, and 9 are cache forms
worked down from quartzite boulders; 9, 10, and 11 are from quartz
pebbles. It will be observed that these six specimens could be used
as knives, or when notched or barbed they were available as
projectile points.
]
“Later the rich deposits of cream white chert located in what is now
Ottawa County, Oklahoma, were discovered, yet this, I am sure, after a
close study of the two flint quarries, must have been in comparatively
recent times, for only a small per cent of implements made of the quarry
chert are found in the hundreds of village-sites and workshops of this
region, and all these, making due allowance for texture and location,
look new compared with the deeply patina-covered and frequently
decomposed surfaces of the pebble flint implement.”
[Illustration:
FIG. 38. (S. 1–3 to 1–6.) Continuation of Professor Holmes’s plate
(Fig. 36). First and second rows, _g_, _h_, and _i_, and _g_, _h_,
are rhyolite and jasper objects of quarry material. These represent
first the blades and forms more convenient for exchange, and in the
series _j_ to _q_ the completed projectile points.
]
Figs. 39 and 40 illustrate the process of manufacture. Fig. 39 shows
native quartzite boulders which have been reduced from _a_, to forms _e_
and _f_. These are not implements, and while Professor Holmes says they
were not transported, yet I am of the opinion that letters _e_, _f_,
_g_, and _h_, represent types which were in such form as would admit of
transportation. That is, they represent stone in such form as to be of
value for barter or exchange. If these specimens show flaws, as might
letters _a_, _b_, and _c_, then they are properly rejects, or if they
have hard protuberances which resisted the skill of the Indian, then
they are rejects.
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