Identifying Lithic Technological Strategies at the Late Paleoindian Sentinel Gap Site Using 3D Digital Morphometrics

Summary

The Late Paleoindian Sentinel Gap site, located along the Columbia River in central Washington, provides a unique data set of bifaces and projectile points/knives (pp/ks) from a single occupation episode dating to c. 10,200 radiocarbon years BP. In addition to over 60 partial and complete bifaces and 11 pp/ks recovered during excavations, 15 lithic debris accumulations interpreted as debitage "dumps" were excavated. The refitting of flakes from one of these features revealed the original core as well as compelling evidence that at least some dump features represent single biface reduction episodes. Most recovered pp/ks were manufactured from non-local materials, indicating construction elsewhere and curation on-site. This study aims to identify technological techniques associated with biface and pp/k manufacture using data derived from 3D models. In addition, the potential for different knappers is examined using 3D digital morphometrics. Comparison of the technological details of lithic tool reduction strategies within the samples of locally manufactured bifaces and introduced pp/ks provides fresh insights on lithic tool manufacturing strategies and the applicability of 3D digital morphometrics as an investigative tool.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 21592