Attached photos show a piece from a local collection that I have never seen before: really RED chert! As you see, the specimen is labeled "Miss." , so I need some help from our southern brethren. Is this 'natural' chert or maybe heat treated chert? Thanks!
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Red Chert From Mississippi? Heat Treated?
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I'm no mineralogist and that's for sure, but I had a few points made of a similar looking material that I was told was Jasper. I collected in north Alabama. I don't know the origin of the Jasper. Most of the points I had were made from Ft.Payne chert but I did have points made from other material.
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In FL we can have reddish, orangish, bluish or yellowish chert depending on the impurities. Most is not "colored" though. I wonder if heat treating can be detected somehow? We assume heat treating with deeper vibrant colors and with types and time periods but I'd like to know if some analysis can detect if it was heated or not. Under extreme magnif. there should be fusion of the grains or fibers within the material from heat treating... Agate, chalcedony, chert, quartz, jasper, flint, carnelian, onyx.... man it is all the "same" cryptocrystalline quartz/silica.
Roger/Painshill had a thread going. Miss that guy boom. https://forums.arrowheads.com/forum/...heat-treatmentProfessor Shellman
Tampa Bay
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I hope you can give us some close up photos of individual points so that we can tell more about the types of lithics you have. No way from the bowl of points to tell whether they compare favorably or not with the artifacf that cmcramer is asking help with. BTW, see my response to Tam.Last edited by sailorjoe; 01-06-2019, 06:29 PM.
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I will try to post them again when it’s light outside. The pics I have won’t load so I will have to take others. I got them from the finder that hunts fields in Mississippi he has a big collection of the material. It comes in many colors and even lavender
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The artifacts that you and Surface Hunter are showing look like they are made from Jasper. From what I've read, it can be found in Arkansas as well as in the Carolinas and Georgia. The native Americans engaged in trade of lithics not found in their own area which explains the occurrence of steatite (soapstone) and other lithics I found in north Alabama that don't occur naturally in surface rock formations and the red colored points I found. That is a possible explanation for what you found. I don't believe heat treating would change the color only enhance it. The red in Jasper comes from iron oxide that gets into quartz or chalcedony. Maybe one of the members who knows mineralogy can explain it better.
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Looking at all the quartz running through that and the small round spots of it I am going to say Chert . Very similar to SW Georgia stuff I find . The jasper seems to be more of a solid more of pure solid to me in my area .
still learning just leaning towards the Chert .
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I had taken a new pic of a couple and your rite Tam it does resemble coastal plains chert. Couldn’t get my pic to load
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Hi Tam. I assume and hope you are talking about the point that cmcramer is asking about and not the bowl of points that surface hunter is talking about. In SH's response to you he seems to think that you are responding to him. I guess coastal plains chert may be a possibility for the point in question. I hadn't considered that possibility, mainly because I collected in Alabama and never found a point made of that type in north Alabama and AL being closer to the areas of coastal plains chert than MS (if the Miss. written on the point is, indeed, MS) I just kinda didn't consider it. We would probably have to have the rock in hand to say with much certainty.
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Yes Sir Joe , it was about that point . Even though I am in SW Georgia I am on the Alabama border or one county over really . I do type many I find in SWG to Alabama in Ovetstreet or Peachtree A .
I noticed some of the lithics seem to be the same or maybe were in trade . Need to really look at the to lithic / Chert deposits better to make a very good case . It’s a process of learning I am in now .
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Hi Tam, I never collected in south Alabama so the lithics there would, it seem, vary a good bit from what I use to find. Yes lithics were in trade for sure and it makes sense that east-west trade that far south of my old hunting grounds would be much easier than north-south trade due to the topography of the area. If the artifact in question is from Mississippi, we don't know what part of the state it was from. North MS points are like the ones in my old hunting grounds. As in south Alabama, south MS may be a different situation.Last edited by sailorjoe; 01-06-2019, 06:38 PM.
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No I don’t think so . What I have learned from Ron’s Posts is as soon as he gets into that rock the colors appear . So that one being solid and like I said I thought I could see some quartz quartz grains in it .
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