Wednesday, June 18, 2014

Cleaned-up small triangle- and more from the same spot last night

     Peter asked for a look at this arrowhead from the previous post after it was cleaned up. These shots give a much better look at the material. You will notice there is still some hazy patina and even dirt. Many collectors scrub their points with a toothbrush to remove this but I just rinse mine off and dry them with a soft towel, I try not to disturb the patina from centuries outdoors. It's hard for me to say what this stone is. Perhaps it is quartzite but I don't know it in this color.

     As I was posting yesterday I started thinking about these finds and the place where I found them. I hadn't spent that much time there, just a couple of hours, and I hadn't searched the whole place. In fact, I had not even searched most of the area that has been most productive for me in the past. Most of the terrain there is flat but there is a gentle slope in one place that rises to a little hill which drops off fairly steeply towards the water on the other side and that is where I find most of the artifacts in that place. It had rained since my visit, too, and probably conditions had changed, doubtless there would be more there to find. Why hadn't I gone back there? I hadn't had any plans to get out and search after work yesterday but I kept thinking about what I might be missing, I didn't have much free time last night but I did swing by there for a short walk. What a lovely evening it was, perfect weather, and quiet in this place, just me and a pretty brown doe and a chubby groundhog out there. It didn't take long at all to find something.
     Only a tiny part of the base had been visible and I thought it was just a flake as I was picking it up. The tip is damaged as you can see and it is fairly crude but these roughly made percussion flaked quartz points do have a lot of appeal to me, they seem to have character somehow and I like to imagine what they would have looked like hafted to a dart. Wading River, I would call this shape, from the Middle Archaic in New England.
    This stemmed base was obvious and easy to spot. Something of a heartbreaker because it is really nicely flaked. But it would have been a very long narrow point and it would be tough to find an unbroken one like this.
     I found a couple of other badly broken fragments as well, hardly worth showing. I'm pleased with these finds, and I still haven't covered the whole area thoroughly. I will go back after a good rain.

6 comments :

pwax said...

Really interesting. Not a material I know.

Curt Hoffman said...

It looks to me like the Goodman's Hill greenish-grey quartzite (aka "metaquartz"). If this is from Peter's area, it's not unlikely - the source is in Sudbury.

Chris Pittman said...

Thanks for the help with the material ID, I appreciate it. This site is in southeastern MA, Plymouth County, but I have found some other regional non-local material as well.

Curt Hoffman said...

Some of the Goodmans Hill material did get traded around the area!

hạt hạnh nhân said...

cute rock

pwax said...

It looks like mylinite. I wonder, is that the same as Goodmans Hill?