Any help with what Ive found?

[eathan]

Any help with what I've found?

I've also posted this in the finds board at http://forum.treasurenet.com/index.php/topic,47167.0.html, but am curious if you all can help tell me what I've got. To me it looks like a bird point, but is there anything interesting I should know about Calapooya bird points?

 

[Atlantis0077]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Morning....

Looks like you have been panning for gold there......that point, would be a "bird" point based on size, but the material escapes me. I know we don't have anything like that in the south. Honestly what it looks like is slag glass. Thats a by product of glass production that comes in a variety of colors...reds, blues, oranges, yellow, etc and is used extensively by flint knappers to make unique colored points. I see a lot of it in Arkansas.

Not saying that is what you have by any means, just that is what it looks like to me based on the lithic material I am familiar with. Did you find it in the field?....If so, that would lend substance to it being an authentic point of unusual stone type.

Atlantis

 

[Cannonman17]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Atlantis- You know what? I thought that same thing! Know what else it reminded me of? I remember hearing a story about some Natives out west who had used pieces of glass from pioneers to flake points- including railroad glass.... hmm... only thing is I would have to guess that would be really rare to find and I would think it would look more transparent. Interesting idea though...

 

[d2]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Looks good to me too. Is the mineral, Jasper, red in colord2

 

[Oroblanco]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Greetings,
A very nice point! I am not sure I agree this looks like glass though, to my eye (and I even went and put on the old eyeglasses this time to be sure) it does look shiny but not quite like glass. It could be wet, and the extra sheen from a water coating since it is in a pan of gold. I would ask you to get a strong magnifying glass and look at the material of the point very closely - see if you can make out any "grain" or not? It could be glass, can't really tell from a photo for sure, and I would hesitate to identify the material based solely on an unusual color and being "shiny". After all we know that arrow points were a good trade item that got transported over great distances in pre-columbian times, so the material might be from a quite distant origin and not similar to anything we find commonly here in the US. A very pretty and unusual point, I would be very pleased to have found that one!
Oroblanco

 

[Cannonman17]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Oro, might be made from something not found here in the U.S. c'mon now buddy, lets not go there again.....

 

[Oroblanco]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Hello Cannonman - heh hehe no I was not really suggesting the point is from "across the pond" but that it might be from a distant place WITHIN the Americas; some of the stone points found in extreme S. America are of very different material than what we commonly find in the continental 48, and those of the north country are often of different material, including some odd shades of natural obsidian. I don't know of any stone points* ever found in the Americas which proved to be of a material NOT found in the Americas, this fact actually is one of the arguments against the Bering Straits migration. There are some well-educated fellows who have proposed a theory they call the "Solutrean Solution" as an answer to some of the origin riddles, perhaps you have read this theory? I am sure there are many articles online in opposition as well as support to the theory, and it is interesting to compare Solutrean points to Clovis, despite the age difference which is also debatable since the periods seem to overlap. Anyway no, not trying to raise a pre-columbian contact issue here only pointing out that the material an unusual point is made of, could be from a distant, but still American location which explains the anomaly.
Oroblanco

*Bone points are another deal, I have covered a small group in the book project that are quite controversial.

 

[deepsix47]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

Nice looking little point. Congrats!!
Deepsix

 

[River Rat]

Re: Any help with what I've found?

G L D!!!

Purty little point...love that color.

RR