A Geometric Morphometric Analysis of Projectile Point Maintenance using Experimental Resharpening Techniques: An Examination of PFP1 Curation, Cooper's Ferry Site, Idaho

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2019: General Sessions" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The implementation of controlled experiments to identify and describe the behaviors of the past has been influential in understanding the material evidence left behind in the archaeological record. This in combination with the advent of new 3D scanning technologies and geometric morphometric analysis methods can be used to establish novel approaches to topics like stone tool curation. A unique opportunity to further morphometric research in tool curation has presented itself in recent findings at the Cooper’s Ferry Site in western Idaho. Excavations have revealed a pattern of stone tool caching associated with a late Pleistocene-aged Western Stemmed Tradition (WST) cultural occupation. In particular, the fourteen projectile points in Pit Feature P1 (PFP1) have been described as displaying distinct characteristics of use and resharpening before being interred into the ground (Davis et al. 2017), an assumption that will be further explored in this study. By introducing a series of resharpening experiments and geometric morphometric analyses, stages of resharpening will be identified and described as a comparative tool for stone tool curation.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25649