Bill Young: Two points from the same time period with strange attributes

By Bill Young

August 16, 2008 09:19 pm

— Two totally different cultures, both dating to around 10,000 years ago, made a significant change in the shape of their projectile point stems used by each culture. The Dalton people and the San Patrice people seemed to have co-existed within the same region at about the time frame although we consider the heartland for the Dalton culture to be northern Arkansas and southern Missouri while the San Patrice culture’s heartland is more to the south in East Texas, eastern Oklahoma and Louisiana.
Within almost every projectile point type we will find some variations. In most cases we attribute this to either the ability of the flint knapper or possibly the quality of the material used. Some 25 years ago, Leroy Johnson published a report in the bulletin of the Texas Archeological Society about two archeological sites. One is known as the Manton Miller site and it is now under the waters of Cooper Lake. The other site is called the Yarbrough site and it is located in Van Zandt County. Both sites had extensive excavation work performed with the recovery of a lot of projectile points, tools and pottery sherds. Many of the dart points were identified as Gary points which typically date to around 1,500 to 3,000 years ago. Mr. Johnson spent a lot of extra time in his analysis on the Gary points and eventually published a chart defining more then 15 different variations of Garys. Some were larger with bigger stems while others were very flat and broad. Even the smaller ones could be identified as Gary points based on the typical shape with a definite contracting stem. Mr. Johnson’s final conclusion was the fact Gary points consistently got smaller though time and they were still in use when the bow and arrow first appeared on the scene. Overall I would agree with his conclusions as I have seen several thousand Gary points from this area. In fact Gary points are the most commonly-found dart point recovered in our region. Even though Gary points do change through time, the overall outline of each one is almost identical.
Variations of the projectile points from the Clovis culture tend to have differences based more on the region from where each type is found. Notice I used the word type instead of variation. Clovis points recovered from sites in the mid-section of the United States are referred to as the western variation of Clovis while the ones recovered from sites along the eastern seaboard have been assigned names other than Clovis. Yet for all practical purposes they are Clovis points just like their western cousins. Some are shorter or smaller yet they are typically fluted and the flaking characteristics are the same as western Clovis points. The differences in size may have more to do with the material utilized rather than with an actual preference for a smaller weapon tip.
If you will look at the two points illustrated in today’s article, the overall outline of each one does not look like the other one. However, both are typical Dalton points. One point has a parallel shaped stem while the other has a concave stem with flaring ears on the base. If the sites of Sloan and Brand in Arkansas and the Big Eddy site in southwestern Missouri had not been successfully excavated, we would not know both types are typical Dalton points dating to the same time period. For instance at the Sloan site in Arkansas, the archeologists recovered just under 150 Dalton points and both types were equally represented. The same is true for the Dalton points found at the Brand site and at Big Eddy. However, the volume of any point type found at the Big Eddy site was considerably lower. This is a very typical situation when archeologists excavate sites within the floodplains of streams and rivers. Sites were occupied for much shorter time periods which in turn reduces the amount of material they left at each site. For instance at the Big Eddy site, only a single example of several dart points was found within a specific soil horizon yet the archeologists were able to separate each horizon from the one below or above. They were also very fortunate to recover dateable material from each horizon.
Going back to today’s illustrations, let’s look first at the parallel-sided stemmed Dalton point. If you will notice along the right hand edge of the blade, the edge has been beveled. You can also see on this same edge the presence of small teeth protruding outward from the blade’s edge. Those teeth tell me the point still has some use-life and could be utilized once more as a saw to cut into either wood, bone or antler. The beveling tells me this point has already gone through at least one resharpening episode and quite possibly another. Yet the point is not used up. The presence of the two small dots located on each side of the stem tell me where the grinding stops on the stem and where the actual blade starts. The use of dots in illustrations to show where the grinding is located is very typical of any archeological publication. One other thing you can see in this illustration is how the point would look if viewed from either the tip or the base. The point takes on a trapezoid shaped cross section.
Now look at the other point. First you will notice the stem is concave on both sides and at the very bottom of the base, ears project outward. Why did the Dalton people produce two totally different stem arraignments at the same time? Once more the archeologists must try to determine the reason for this unusual stem shape. The general consensus is that the ears were the most important attribute and to make sure they had ears on each piece, they made the stem slightly concave to better accent the ears. Why would ears be so important? It has to do with the hafting of the point. If the ears were present, the Dalton people would have a protrusion sticking outward which would help facilitate the secured attachment of the stone tip to the atlatl shaft. There is no doubt the Dalton people were commonly using their weapon tips as knives so we see so much evidence of resharpening and teeth located on the blades of Dalton points.
Next week: What did the San Patrice people do which so similar to the Dalton

Copyright © 1999-2008 cnhi, inc.