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The other side of the model
Hummingbird Point:
See how how I roped you in with "model"? "Click bait" I think the tech savvy boys call that.
Some discussion here lately on Cushing's knapping model, which I think has gone a bit askew. Again, for those interested, read it for yourself, about 10 pages in under "The making of arrows", : http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/aa.1895.8.4.02a00010/epdf
Cushing's model is clearly divided into two pieces: What happens at the quarry and what happens away from the quarry. At the quarry is the spalling and bifacing steps. Away from the quarry are the finishing, use and resharpening steps.
The focus to date has been on an interpretation of one of the finishing techniques. But, before that happens, you need a biface to finish. An impression has been given that the soft hammer direct percussion methods that are the mainstay of modern knapping fall outside of Cushings model. They very clearly do not. Per Cushing, the hammer stone derived spalls are then made into bifacial preforms using direct percusion on top of the knee or a padded stone using antler, bone or soft stone set in a "lightweight handle". He notes this is done ""with almost incredible rapidity", later claiming production of "seven finished knife and arrow blades in exactly 38 minutes". So basically Cushing says direct percusion on the leg, just like most of us do it, but he replaces the billet with a hammer type tool.
Hammer stone spall, raw Texas chert, piece from center of nodule, 95mm L by 85mm W by 23mm T.
Using the base of an elk spike antler lashed to a T shaped branch with rawhide to create a hammer like tool, then used for all flaking of this spall, 10 minutes later, 75mm L by 47mm W by 7.5mm
T:
Sample of flakes harvested for use as tools, 2 inches plus:
It is at this point I would switch to indirect percussion and/or pressure to finish the piece. However, I would stress for newer knappers, you absolutely do not need to push your preforms this far with direct percussion. Go as far as you feel comfortable with, then switch to indirect. Over time you will find yourself being able to go further and further with the direct, which mostly just saves time.
The idea behind Cushing's model is to send your best knappers to the quarry, let them make the "blanks" which everyone else can then relatively easily finish and use as needed. If I and 4 other "professional" preform makers went into the quarry with some young guys to quarry and spall, leaving the "pros" to biface, we could very easily make 120 quality, late stage bifaces and still only have to work 5 hours that day with a 20% failure rate. One trip for a day or two a month is a couple thousand bifaces with all kinds of time left for the other hundred things that needed to get done yesterday!
Keith
Hummingbird Point:
A few more pictures. Modifying the model by using Flowering dogwood for my hammer head, two hammers, one about 2.5 inches in diameter for early work, one about 1.5 inches diameter for later. Spall from Virginia cobble quartzite, 135mm L by 125mm W by 31mm T. Unfortunately that ridge in the center represents junk material that needs to be blasted out:
Needed 17 minutes, but usually average 21 with a failure rate of 40%. "Quarry blank" is 73mm L by 43mm W by 8.5mm T.(I would stress that a preform of this size is great at 10mm thick, with a few "lumps" thicker, I just got lucky on this one. If you want to knap this stuff, do not try to push it this thin.) Sorry the flake scars don't show well, nature of the beast!
Due to the nature of the material, flakes tend to break as they come off, so not a good material for flake tools. The chip pile:
mullet:
This makes a lot more sense. James Parker explained a lot of this to me, but could you show a picture of your tools?
Chippintuff:
Great thread. There is nothing muddy here.
WA
Hummingbird Point:
Oh, James Parker! Say hi to him for me!
All the info on how I do the antler hammers is housed at the link below. I have made no significant changes since then: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/paleoplanet69529/antler-hammers-t60533.html#p60179
I have found the "lightweight handle" to be important. I like weight forward and high head speed, but that may just be me. (Ballistically I knap with a small bullet going fast rather than a big bullet going slow, but have no idea why.)
Maybe someday I will do a video, but I don't know that it would help much. The differences are subtle. The handle allows the head to be pulled and twisted in various ways on impact to change the flaking. Early on striking straight into the edge with the handle pointed toward me gets those big, expanding flakes helpful in early reduction. Later, striking with the handle pointed toward the ground and rolling the head downward at impact produces long parallel sided flakes. Not that any of that really matters, I figured that out just naturally by doing it. Better to not think too much about it.
The late stage preform below shows the variety of flakes. All flakes are taken with the same elk hammer. Looking at the top edge, at the tip you can see the expanding overface type flake. Coming down the edge you see what looks like pressure flakes, then in the base what looks like punch flakes. This is why when archaeologists talk about how flaking was done I just quietly groan.
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