Found an interesting Rock in Eastern Montana

[Ethan24]

Hello all,
I recently visited Glendive, Montana for the first time and was shown around by my Grandfather in-law. He was almost 90 years old and full of history and stories. I found myself looking for arrowheads one day in the badlands, a mountainous area that interestingly erodes over time. I searched for hours and found myself looking up and down the mountain sides. I came up with a very interesting rock that seemed out of place. The color and size stood out. What I found very interesting were the notches on both sides, coupled with the sharp edge. It was easy to hold in your hand, and the notches fit my thumb easily. I'm not sure if this is a native american artifact or what. Maybe someone can help me with this one. I am dying to find out. My wife teases me about my interest and I would love to prove her wrong. I've attached pictures, they aren't very good but I hope they help. Thanks!

 

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[Cannonman17]

Looking at the pictures it's difficult to tell what you have for sure, possilbe hand axe but anyways.. I would like to take this example and this opportunity to clear something up about Native American artifacts. I frequently see things in items descriptions that include "it's worn down so that it fits in the hand just right" or "it appears to be worn flat where your fingers go" or something like this. Native American artifacts (or any stone artifacts for that matter) did NOT get wear spots from use by human hands, or at least not enough to make a visible difference. Take a river cobble for example. Find a nice round one that fits in the hand and find another rock and pound away with it. I guarentee that the hammer stone (river cobbel) will completely discinagrate long before any wear spots appear from you holding it. The item in the picture does appear to have flaking scars at the end which would of course indicate that it's an human made artifact of some sort- a better detailed picture would help. If this is the case, the slightly worn area on the flat side would be one of two things, first and most likely just a natural occurance. Rocks are not always uniform in hardness and will errode at different rates thus producing "wear spots", holes, and all sorts of interesting little things. Two it may have been a dual purpose tool, I often find this on hammerstones where the outside edges are worn and pitted and the center or flat side of the hammerstone will have a depression or groove from things like basal thinning or secondary flaking. Hope this clears it up.