85 Pound Core: KY Hornstone

[Ron Kelley]

The ancient Native Americans removed many spalls from this KY Hornstone nodule. The longest spall was just over nine inches. Even with all the material that was removed the Hornstone nodule still weighs in at 85 pounds.

[Hi-Lo]

Wow! That's cool. Is that your artifact Ron?

[Ron Kelley]

Hey David, Yes I purchased the nodule to knap. I didn't realize that it was an ancient core until it arrived today. Now I may have to set it aside and just admire it for a time.

[Ron Kelley]

I purchased many Tiger Chert pieces that turned out to be ancient spalls.

[Kyflintguy]

Wow! Thats amazing! How the heck did they spall off of those round edges??? Just doesn't seem like it could work that way but it obviously did.... Baffling!

[Ron Kelley]

Hey Josh, I have spalled some round fieldstones of Hornstone. You have to hit it pretty hard to do the kind of spalling that you see here. I will try to get some better pictures. I will have to use a darker background; Snow as a background just doesn't work well.

[Six nations son]

Wow Ron. That is Awesome. Killer Display piece. Never seen anything like it!

[Ron Kelley]

Here is another view. In the lower center of this picture you can see where the spall went to black hornstone. The brown rind on this nodule is good chert.

[CoachG]

If you had it shipped I bet that was a nice chunk of change. It'd be hard to knock anything off that core with the ancients getting so much use out of it. Hope you keep it intact.

[gregszybala]

That is cool, what an artifact!

[OnewiththewilD]

i wonder if they were using some kind of wooden mallet and a bone or stone chisel to spall it, or if they were just doing direct percussion to bop em' off?

[Ron Kelley]

Hey Jay, I was wondering the same myself. I wish I could spall like that. They were making very good use of the material. Very controlled thickness of spalls.

[Scorpion68]

I bet they used an 8lb sledge - Just like I'd do. Oh, that's right - this is ancient stuff. What happens if you just smack that thing on one end. Would it break in half or would it break into many, many pieces?? ...Chuck

[Ron Kelley]

It would be easy to break it into chunks rather that thin spalls: That wouldn't be good.

[sailorjoe]

Hi Ron. I just gotta wonder where is the source and how and under what circumstances it was obtained. Was it from an ancient quarry and picked up by the seller? etc, etc. etc. I've seen some large layers of Ft. Payne chert in the eastern Highland Rim of Tennessee where it would be possible to mine large chunks of chert but nothing ever like this. Pretty amazing for sure.

[Ron Kelley]

Hey Joe, I have been buying some high grade KY hornstone from a guy I met on an artifacts site. When he finds a nice nodule that is good for sawing he lets me know. This nodule was in a small stream almost completely buried. He recognized it as hornstone but really didn't have a clue that it was an ancient core that the Native Americans had been using. He was on an ancient site looking for points when he spotted the hornstone nodule. The Ky hornstone nodules are just rounded field stones. This is by far the biggest one that I have purchased.

[SDhunter]

Very cool artifact. I have found numerous cores, but pretty much all would fit in my hand.

[clovisoid]

That is a very cool nodule/core.

I've seen a lot of big cores before, but I've never seen a nodule worked quite like that. It's clearly been worked/spalled, I just don't know how they did that all over... I have no idea how they managed to take those spalls like that all over the surface. I've seen a lot of smaller hornstone nodules that were "peeled" but you can usually see where they "got traction" on the rock and drove off spalls from a ridge. Most of the bigger nodules were just split down the middle so they could drive off large spalls. My best guess is that they started working one spot, and just followed the next best platform and it went all over the rock, but it's way cool!)

It's a great piece, and in my humble opinion worthy of being saved from the saw. That might be the largest hornstone relic in existence. (Seriously, I'd bet a hornstone collector would pay more for the relic than what another 85lbs of KY hornstone would cost you.)

[Ron Kelley]

Thanks Joshua, I have several hundred pounds of rock to work. I think I'll just keep this core.

[Whippoorwill]

Here is a 10 lb piece I found in South Logan County, Ky

[Kyflintguy]

I'm still amazed by this artifact Ron! It's in the right home with you, who can appreciate it for what it was more than what it could be.

[tomclark]

Holy Cow, Ron, I'm glad this post showed back up! Hadn't seen it..

[Ron Kelley]

Hey Tom, This is the most unusual artifact i have. I have spalled several hornstone nodules but never like this.