Horse Creek chert from Tennessee

CaptEsteban · Mar 2, 2019

A relative of mine sent me a smaller piece of Horse Creek Chert. BEAUTIFUL chert !! This is a picture lifted from another online site. My pieces are too small to show the beauty of it. Does anyone here work with it , or have access to some ?

ToddsPoint · Mar 3, 2019

I've worked it. It chips okay and has the 3 nice colors in some pieces. I've never been able to get much. I've only got one point I made from it. Gary

MosesOfTheSouth · Mar 3, 2019

i'm in tenn. does anyone know the location of the outcrops/ quarries? i don't know if i have seen that type chert in anything i have personally found.

Quartzite Keith · Mar 3, 2019

I've knapped some of it here and there. Most is fairly tough. Technically it is a jasper and like most jaspers in its raw state you need to really hit it to get the flakes to run. The "classic" Horse Creek is red, yellow and black, below a few pieces that show some other variations.

CaptEsteban · Mar 7, 2019

My relative found it just N. of Lake Pickwick, in Hardin County.

https://tennesseearchaeologycouncil.wordpress.com/tag/chert/

MosesOfTheSouth · Mar 9, 2019

I thought it might be from the west side of the state. thanks for confirming. It's enjoyable personally, learning about lithics, trying to accurately identify them, and having some concept of how far it traveled in it's life. Recently found some areas that are producing a large amount of worked "Del Rio" material. It's supposed to be some what rare and desirable from what i understand, coming from small and very localized outcroppings.

i'll keep my eyes peeled for chunks of horse creek for you CaptE. I'm a bit of a walk east from Hardin county, not nearly as far as some of the recorded distances of material being found from it's source tho.

MosesOfTheSouth · Mar 9, 2019

Quartzite Keith said:
I've knapped some of it here and there. Most is fairly tough. Technically it is a jasper and like most jaspers in its raw state you need to really hit it to get the flakes to run. The "classic" Horse Creek is red, yellow and black, below a few pieces that show some other variations.

View attachment 1686732

is it something that gets's better with a bit of heat treating?

those pieces have a similar kind of dry/chalky look, and share some color similarities to stuff found locally for me.
find it reasonably close to larger outcroppings of really high quality FT Payne of a local black variety (heat treating totally ruins it).

Quartzite Keith · Mar 9, 2019

MosesOfTheSouth said:
is it something that gets's better with a bit of heat treating?

those pieces have a similar kind of dry/chalky look, and share some color similarities to stuff found locally for me.
find it reasonably close to larger outcroppings of really high quality FT Payne of a local black variety (heat treating totally ruins it).

I'm not really the person to ask, so research this, but going from memory: Yes it can be heat treated. The red parts turn purple. You'll have to look up temps and cook time.