Odd Steatite Sherd

[CMD]

Yeah, that's great Paul! Just have not seen that surface treatment on my sherds and bowl forms. Most of my exterior surfaces are actually finished more and that appears to perhaps be the reason I don't see that surface treatment. In the case of my sherd, after the rodent suggestion was made, for what it was worth, I pictured the rodent holding it, it's front feet used as hands, as rodents are want to do when eating, and just noted that he didn't nibble the edges or the other side of the sherd.
Anyway, as noted, rodent marks have been confused even with decorative incisions at times. And not really hard to understand why that happens. Of course, it might be fairest to at least acknowledge that rodent gnaw marks resemble those very pick marks to some degree. In the case of a small sherd, perhaps you cannot rule it out, but given the fact that these tool marks are produced by picks during manufacturing, the path of least resistance, as in parsimony in other words, must favor tool scars.

[CMD]

As long as the photo uploader is working again. While I was searching though dozens of sherds and forms searching for examples of tool marks, I noticed this tiny thin sherd. I've concluded that these look like decorative incisions, and not simply scratches from manufacturing. Too tiny to know what it was a part of. If near top of bowl, my understanding is that decoration was added similar to decorations on pottery as the transition was made to pottery. Or maybe part of an ornament. Just seem too straight and paired and looks more like decorative incisions, but :dunno: for sure.......

[pkfrey]

I think from the very slight concavity, that's the interior side of a shard broken from something else. It's to small to positively state it's from a large bowl, it could be a section broken from a pendant, or even a wing from a bannerstone. But the lines appear intentionally incised, decorative marks. They could also be tool marks, but we wouldn't know for sure unless we could see the artifact that the shard came from. During the Early Woodland period, soapstone still saw quite a bit of use in other artifacts, such as pendants, gorgets, beads, and bannerstones.  Small ladles, cups, and spoons were also made from soapstone. Also, the tool kit inventory changed from the Transitional Period to the Early Woodland. Small soapstone objects were also shaped using pointed bone tools.

[Olden]

Thought I'd interject here to an old post
Charlie, In my eyes the marks on your sherd look like purposeful decorations.
Paul's bowl example (from Roberts Island MD.) seems to have a slight basket motive on the exterior,
but the soapstone fragment I found in Charles Co. Md. leaves no doubt - it's a basket motif.