Cmd

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Charlie, aka CMD
I am interested in your thoughts on this piece of ochre. I must admit that I have been remiss in A picking this material up, and B, not studying the material more. My thinking on the subject is that you are the most knowledgeable person on this site, about the world wide use of the material. There is no way to date the material to my knowledge, and I have no idea of all the uses. Please Sir, if you could enlighten me on this piece. JJ

[Lindenmeier-Man]

I did the best I could taking pics. The seven facets were hard to focus on.....

[tomclark]

Ochre is amorphous (no shape). Doesn't occur as crystals or have any "facets". That piece is definitely Man-altered due to the facets and the grain-marks on the faces of the "facets" from the abrasion to make dye/paint.

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Thanks Tom !

[Kentucky point]

Yeah, I agree with tom. Sometimes when I grind a stone to make powder, it looks like that. I don't know why I didn't think of it earlier.

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Most of it I find is just in clumps, I’ve not given attention as to if it were worked. Most is red but some is more yellow. I picked the piece up , looked at it, my thought was what the heck ! 47 years looking at it and sometimes dropping back on the ground. What a mistake on my part !

[Hoss]

It is a paint stone. Native American artifact for sure. I will dig up an old thread on these. I have one that is very similar dug in Connecticut and 11KBP also showed a bunch https://forums.arrowheads.com/forum/...ng-stone/page2

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Wow Hoss, that one you displayed is almost identical to this recent find ! I’ve made a mistake by not picking up and studying the pigment stones. I’m not aware of any place close , as to where the lithic material may have come from. Yours and mine have facets ... I suppose they were discarded after they were just to small to obtain any powder. I’d still like to hear from Charlie .. Thanks for the link !

[SurfaceHunter]

You would think when it got small like that they would just crush it

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Exactly !

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Well gang, the more I study this THING the more confusing it gets. In pic 7 , what looks like metallic on the edge is metallic ! It looks like the ochre is covering the metallic area as a patina... So, I’m very confused....Graphite is discussed above, and I’m not a geologist but I wouldn’t think if it were , it would get a patina...I’ve spent a great deal of time looking, scoping , and thinking about this tiny thing.. Perhaps I’d of been better off not finding it in that wash. Confounded !

[redrocks]

Is the metallic edge ferrous?

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Non magnetic

[flintguy]

I may be mistaken but isn't it a type of iron ore? The red is basically rust. Ferric oxide.

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Don’t know, sent pics to my cousin a master degree geologist . Got a answer from her I will post below....

[filmiracl]

Hematite (aka iron ore)

[SurfaceHunter]

Maybe a game piece you just never know. Is it heavy for its size?

[Lindenmeier-Man]

I just don’t know SH, I’ll label and gps, then bag the THING.

[Lindenmeier-Man]

My cousin , a geologist replied to the pics I sent her. She said it is a natural stone... I formally apologize to everyone for taking up their time, and the site in general.. I guess I’ll throw it in the truck tool box with all my flint shreds. JJ

[SurfaceHunter]

No disrespect but how does a geologist know?

[Lindenmeier-Man]

I’m not a geologist SH, so I don’t know. Did Rain on my party as I’ve never found anything like it.She said she has seen stones like that, maybe she was looking at artifacts and did not know ?!? Still waiting to see if Charlie has any thoughts.

[flintguy]

Hey, info got passed around on this threat. That's a good thing. Even if its not what Tom suggested (still think it is). You might want to hold on to it a little while longer. Hard for us to say from just pics.

[flintguy]

Hoss post also. Good info in general.

[Hoss]

That is not natural at all JJ I can see where yours has abrasions on it. I feel the small faceted edges were used to draw and color things. If you wet this stuff you can rub the pigment right onto a hide to create art.

[Lindenmeier-Man]

Susan, my cousin the geologist says natural abrasion can cause that look. I asked if on the same facet as to why the abrasions were in two different directions ... She said IDK.. I’m not going to do any tests of the THING, just label it as a oddity and put a gps shot with it.. Thanks Hoss!

[filmiracl]

And my post saying hematite, I was simply identifying the material. As noted by a few people, it was used by man for it's pigment... hence the facets from grinding/rubbing. It's not just a "rock" (for once.)