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**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:42 PM

Posted by [greywolf22]
Andy
Here are some pictures of Acheulian artifacts, but I doubt that is what you have.
Acheulian Axheads:

Acheulia Biface:

Lower Paleothic stone Tools - Europe

Jack

Posted by [huntsman]
Thank you very much, Jack. I do realize that my cache is NOT Acheulian. It's just that the shapes of these tools, except for the size difference(which is significant) and flake patterns, look Acheulian.

By the way,
GREAT 2000th post. Congrats on being such a prolific contributor. I greatly appreciate it!

Posted by [shartis]
That is a neat find huntsman. I watched a friend of mine dig up one on the site we hunt that looks very similar to yours. It was 36 pieces of ryolite. We found lots of Morrow Mounts around made of the same type ryolite.

Posted by [greywolf22]
Andy
Thanks. I like it here and like to help educate when I can. I also learn a lot from being here. I get to see so much neat stuff like your neat cache that I would not if I was not here.
That top picture shows a lot of spals that have cortex on them , these are the first spals to removed in the deconstruction of a core. The core would be cleaned of cortex as it is not useful for the most part for making points. They natives would want material clean of cortex to flake points out of.
Can you show us pictures of the other side of these.
Jack

Posted by [shartis]
Huntsman here is my friends cache that is similar to yours. Thought it might be interesting to see the similarities.

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:44 PM

Posted by [huntsman]
Here ya go Jack

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:47 PM

Posted by [huntsman]

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:50 PM

Posted by [huntsman]

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:52 PM

Posted by [huntsman]
Thank you very much Samuel for posting your friends cache. It does look similar to mine. Does his have any of the tertiary flaking along the edges?

Posted by [shartis]
Huntsman all I can remember is two or three in the top row were worked into more of preforms/blades then the others. I don't remembering any showing chipping around the edges like some of yours. We found woodland to late archaic around the site and a small amount of paleo with a couple hundred yards but morrowmounts were abundent. We found a late archaic cache near by that had lots of tools and about 22 kirk bifurcated points with a large slab we believe was used as a cutting table. Thanks for posting your finds very interesting seeing your stuff.

Posted by [CliffJ]
Nice cache find, huntsman!
My theory is that a native from your SC area made a trip up to collect flint in the Uwharrie Mountains of NC where he picked up a large bag full of much earlier knapped rhyolite spalls that lay on the ground around the outcroppings. As he collected, he bopped out some of these into rough bifaces, either testing the material (which can vary), or merely cutting his weight he had to carry home. He packed the sack full of preforms back to SC and buried them in the corner of the house where you found them. While they COULD BE used as tools as-is, there was a long way to go in knapping them into projectiles and tools. I'd like to see the one finished piece up close- is the base finished, or snapped off, or unfinished? What type would you call that piece?

Posted by [huntsman]
CliffJ wrote:
Nice cache find, huntsman!
My theory is that a native from your SC area made a trip up to collect flint in the Uwharrie Mountains of NC where he picked up a large bag full of much earlier knapped rhyolite spalls that lay on the ground around the outcroppings. As he collected, he bopped out some of these into rough bifaces, either testing the material (which can vary), or merely cutting his weight he had to carry home. He packed the sack full of preforms back to SC and buried them in the corner of the house where you found them. While they COULD BE used as tools as-is, there was a long way to go in knapping them into projectiles and tools. I'd like to see the one finished piece up close- is the base finished, or snapped off, or unfinished? What type would you call that piece?

Holy cow CliffJ you've given me goosebumps. You don't know just how precisely you've hit the nail on the head. I haven't told anyone this except my wife but within 3 feet of the cache; I dug my 1st post hole. I know it was a post hole based on the much darkersoil that came out of this perfectly round hole. I saved some of the darker material so it could be carbon dated if needed. The post hole:

Cliff, here are closeups of the single blade found. From what I can tell, I'd say the base was unfinished but others should make that call. I'd have no idea what I'd call it. Again, I'll let others hypothesize its type and would welcome all comments most graciously. Thank you for your input. Again, it was kinda spooky reading your comment knowing you had no idea I'd dug a post hole very nearby. Trip-ola!!!

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:55 PM

Posted by [gregszybala]
Andy, great find and this post just keeps getting better and better, you gotta be stoked!

Posted by [huntsman]
Thank you kindly, Greg. I appreciate all the replies and informative input from members here. And yes I'm most royally stoked over this find. The feedback I'm getting is oh so inspirational. So much so; daybreak will find me with a shovel in hand at my dig.

Posted by [CliffJ]
The one almost complete piece looks closest to a Morrow Mountain in form and flaking. If all the patina looked like that one, I'd surmise it was a Morrow Mountain cache. However, observing the preforms, many appear to have much more recent flaking going on- but the more finished piece has no such recent flaking. Looking at the preform patina, there could be thousands of years between the original reduction and the cached preforms. I'm thinking that the more finished piece was picked up along with the rhyolite preforms in NC, and buried with them for later use. The fresher, blacker rhyolite flakes were not knapped in Morrow Mountain times, or they would display more patina change by now, as seen on the remainder of the flaking on the preforms.
How old is the site? I think that your cache could be Late Archaic or even later- but it will be hard or impossible to tell I guess, as their hidey hole intrudes through your levels.

Posted by [huntsman]
Hi Cliff,
Thank you very much for the continued input and dialogue on this cache.

I understand what you're saying about the patina change but for the record the darker areas were very much exaggerated because they were still wet from cleaning. There is still the change in patina; it's just not as exaggerated in the pics (anymore). I have only cleaned 14 pieces; the rest haven't been cleaned at all and still retain original dirt on them.

As far as age of my dig site; I’d say it’d be considered a multi component site beginning with Stanly complex through Savannah River complex. However, I do find earlier Palmer points here as well. I would say that I probably do find mostly Morrow Mountains followed very closely with Stanly Stemmed. (I said earlier I thought to most prolific were the Stanly. I was wrong and mispoke.) These are followed by an occasional Kirk and a Guilford. Heck I even find Randolph’s and Yadkins. So to put a date on it would be hard for me, probably not so hard for experienced others. I guess I’d put inhabitation on this site to at least to around 7000-8000 B.P. based on the Palmers found and it continued to possibly historic times. Does this make sense?

Actually the cache “hidey hole” did not intrude the upper levels but was below all currently excavated levels. I’m not being argumentative I’m just clarifying the “intruding” statement.

Please, I don't mind being told I'm wrong I just want valued, experienced insight into what it is I have. Please accept my queries on this thread and others as a means for me to gain knowledge of the subject and learn something new.

Thank you again Cliff for your input.

Posted by [shartis]
Huntsmam your site sounds just like the one we are on. Ya find much pottery? Here is a pic. of a broken base I think is MM. It is ryolite (creek stained). Looks very simialar to the blade you have. I think Cliffj may have mentioned it but you think it is possible the woodland indains may found the cache and maybe used some of it and started on the pieces you have. The last pic. is a woodland point that they made from a piece of ryolite that probably left by the earlier indains. Be nice to go back in time for a day or two, boy would we have answers then.

Posted by [huntsman]
shartis wrote:
Huntsmam your site sounds just like the one we are on. Ya find much pottery? Here is a pic. of a broken base I think is MM. It is ryolite (creek stained). Looks very simialar to the blade you have. I think Cliffj may have mentioned it but you think it is possible the woodland indains may found the cache and maybe used some of it and started on the pieces you have. The last pic. is a woodland point that they made from a piece of ryolite that probably left by the earlier indains. Be nice to go back in time for a day or two, boy would we have answers then.

Hi Samuel,
Yes I do find pottery sherds all the time. I have even been fortunate enough to find soapstone bowl fragments. There is a soapstone quarry in the next county that Tom Clark told me about.
I'm absolutely convinced that CliffJ has hit this one out of the park. Everything he's said has been spot on. Thank you CliffJ! My innitial kneejerk reaction was that I thought the preform was way too thin. Then I pulled out a couple of my MM cache projectiles that I found several years ago and sure enough the thickness of the preform was almost identical to several of these cache pieces. I found the Morrow Mountain Cache 300-400 yards from this cache. Three of them are in my profile pic. I'm stoked as heck to now have a Morrow Mountain preform cache (or even later into Woodland)to go along with my MM cache. It is still a cache and I'm liking it bigtime! WOOOOOOO-HOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!
Yep, that looks like one of those bigger MM bases. Shame about that one. I bet in it's day it was stunning.

Thank you Samuel for your input. That Woodland point has the same same look as my stuff. Cool!

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:56 PM

Posted by [CliffJ]
Hi Andy,
As Sam shows on his triangle, there is no doubt a long time period between the reduction of the preforms to the test boppping done on the edges. I'd like to see a closeup of the edge of one of those that you washed. You may be able to determine, from other points from the same site made of the same type of rhyolite, about how long ago the edges were flaked. As with Sam's triangle, the heavily patinated surface was done long before the dark edges. You will rarely if ever find a heavily patinated triangle made of good rhyolite, as they are only hundreds not thousands of years old. The soil chemistry has much to do with the rate, so compare identical rhyolite from the same location, whatever degree of patination is on those edges should be similar to some level of points found on your site- I've suggested perhaps later than Morrow Mountain only from the more finished preform you found in the cache. Its association with the other "rechipped" preforms suggests that it was picked up as-is, as a source for future projectiles, at the same time that the other preform material was buried. I cannot see much patina change on the edges, but if some is apparent, it will probably be closest to that on your triangles, furthest from your Palmers/Early Archaic examples of rhyolite.

Posted by [greywolf22]
Andy
Just got back. I took the weekend off to take a few long walks, did not find anything, but cleared my mind.
I see this thread has grown. I read what Cliff said about the material based on the new pictures you posted and agree with what he is saying. You can see multiple layers of patination on some of these pieces, which means the spals were old when picked up and reworked at a later date.
Spals on one face are normally uniface, which means it is smooth faced, there is one picture where you can see the uniface and along the edge is fresh chip out which is a different color than the uniface, the uniface has a deeper patination than the edge chipping.

Jack

Posted by [wmwallace]
Andy awesome find, Cliff and Jack awesome education!!! As our old friend Chuck would say I would definately need a diaper if I found something like that, historic. Thanks for sharing-Bill

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 04:59 PM

Posted by [huntsman]
Thank you CliffJ, thank you Jack, and thank you William!!!!
So sorry I've not replied sooner but work has been running me. I was able to today take pics of one of the nicer cleaned pieces to get closeup pics of the edgework.
The patina is VERY close on this side

Not so on this side.

Here's the requested edge closeup.

Another closeup. You can see the thickness of this ?tool? at its back.

Here is another piece that has NOT been cleaned. It is heaqvily flaked on one side.

Here's the opposite side.

Posted by [greywolf2]
Andy
This shows the edge chipping to be done at a later date than when the spals were originally removed from the core it was taken from. Very nice find and two or more cultures involved makes it even nicer.
Jack

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 05:00 PM

Posted by [huntsman]
Thanks again Jack. This has all become wilder than my wildest dreams.
After posting the above pics I realized the patina on the piece in the second pic looks awfully thick. I'm not saying I don't like it; I'm just making an observation and posting a queery. The strike shows the thickness in the pic below. How thick does/can patina get? From the pic it looks to be at least 1/16" thick maybe more. It's hard to tell because the flake crosses the patina at an angle making the patina look thicker than it really is.

Posted by [CliffJ]
Andy,
Patina on rhyolite can get very thick and chalky as it lay for thousands of years. That example had been exposed for a very long time before it was picked up and tested with a few bops before being carried south to SC. If you have points from the site made of the same grade of rhyolite with similar patina showing on the flaking, what types would they be? That may be a clue to narrow down the age of the cache. If it were a Yadkin cache, for instance, I'd think that the flaking would be darker and less patinated. If it were Clovis, the test bops would hardly be evident against the original rind and patina areas. I think your cache falls somewhere in the Late Archaic probably.
Cliff

Posted by [huntsman]
Thank you again very much CliffJ. I believe I now have a clearer grasp of what I've been oh so fortunate to find. With your help and the help of others here I've learned a whole lot of new. I'll certainly be taking a closer look at the rhyolite pieces I find on this site.
As usual, with knowledge comes more questions. Since I've taken such care to document this find and since it possibly spans the time periods of at least two different cultures, would it be a good idea to have this cache authenticated. If so who should do it and what possibly could be gained by having it authenticated? In y'alls opinion, does the significance of this find warrant any further documentation? Is there a single guru authenticator that does mostly these types of artifacts?
Thanks again y'all. Everyone here is such a big help.
Andy

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 05:05 PM

Posted by [shartis]
Here are some pictures of a late archaic cache. The greenish slab was with it and is believed to be work/cutting table. Some of the blanks were in pieces and I glued back. It was looked at by a man that digs and researches at the Toppler site and he said that the pieces were broke off in the u shaped pieces and possibly used as tools to get open bone. Point type is Kirk bifurcated.

**painshill** · 11-01-2016, 05:10 PM

Posted by [shartis]

Posted by [huntsman]
Wow Samuel that slab is something else and the serrations on the Biffy Kirks are fantastic. I love finding those. I bet you still dream about that day. Is this the cache you found or is this one your digging partner found on your dig site? Thank you for sharing regardless. It made my day.

Posted by [CliffJ]
Andy,
I would frame all of those pieces together that you found together, and call it what you want. You could send it to five authenticators and come up with five opinions as to what they think they are. You already know that they are authentic, heck, a blind man would know that (with our rhyolite). Caches of preforms are fairly commonly found and while interesting from a theoretical approach, they are not particularly desired by collectors (unless they find them). We have found five different caches over the years, but never got insitu video like you did. Good job!

Posted by [shartis]
huntsman wrote:
Wow Samuel that slab is something else and the serrations on the Biffy Kirks are fantastic. I love finding those. I bet you still dream about that day. Is this the cache you found or is this one your digging partner found on your dig site? Thank you for sharing regardless. It made my day.

Thanks man. I was on cloud nine for a while after that. My friend was right beside me and he found the eight in the smaller picture. Can't wait to ride that cloud again.

Posted by [huntsman]
CliffJ wrote:
Andy,
I would frame all of those pieces together that you found together, and call it what you want. You could send it to five authenticators and come up with five opinions as to what they think they are. You already know that they are authentic, heck, a blind man would know that (with our rhyolite). Caches of preforms are fairly commonly found and while interesting from a theoretical approach, they are not particularly desired by collectors (unless they find them). We have found five different caches over the years, but never got insitu video like you did. Good job!

Thank you, Cliff. This has been a great learning experience for me and I really appreciate and value the education. This cache will go into some sort of case to be seen. I just haven't figured that part out yet.

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