WHAT IS THE MORROW MOUNTAIN POINT?

Middle Archaic bifacially worked chipped stone projectile points of eastern North America dating to the period c. 6000–4000 bc. The points are triangular in outline with slightly flared sides towards the base and a small rounded tang on the base.

WHAT IS THE MICROLITH?

Any of various very small stone tools varying in size from 1 to 5 cm (0.4–2 inches) – mainly thin blades or blade fragments with sharp cutting edges, usually geometric in shape, and set into a wooden handle or shaft or the tip of a bone or antler as an arrow point. They were shaped by abrupt retouch into various shapes like triangles and crescents. Microliths were produced during  the later Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic and were either struck as blades from very small cores or were made from fractured blades using the microburin technique. They are characteristic, for example, of the Azilian culture of the Mesolithic. Microliths represent both a versatile and an economic use of raw material – just as blades yield more cutting edge than flakes per unit weight of raw material, so bladelets improve yet further this advantage, by a factor of something over 100 compared to core tools. [pigmy stone]

WHAT IS THE MICROBURIN?

A microlith produced by notching and snapping a blade; a small piece of stone snapped off a microlith which is a byproduct of the manufacture of microliths. A blade is notched and then snapped off where the chipping has narrowed and weakened it. One piece becomes a microlithic tool, while the residue (the microburin) still shows traces of the original notch and fracture. Certain trapeze-shaped microliths were made from the central part of a double-notched blade, in which case both ends have the appearance of microburins. This procedure allowed the maker to obtain a strong head with a sharp point by breaking up flint blades after making a notch in them – a practice widespread in the Mesolithic as a means of manufacturing arrowheads. The name originates from the erroneous belief that these pieces were the same as burins. [microburin technique]

WHAT IS THE LEVANNA POİNT?

Projectile points are usually associated with Late Woodland and Contact Period occupations in southern New England (c. 700–300 bp). Common material types associated with this point include quartz, quartzite, hornfels, and basalt. Nonlocal cherts were also used in the manufacture of this point type. The Levanna point type is characterized by the equilateral triangular form and concave base.

WHAT IS THE LEVALLOIS TECHNIQUE?

A distinctive method of stone toolmaking in which flakes are removed by percussion from a preshaped core, with little other modification. This prepared-core knapping technique allows the removal of large flakes of predetermined size and shape. The face of the core is trimmed to shape in order to control the form and size of the intended flake. Characteristically the preparatory flaking is directed from the periphery of the core towards the center. The residual core is shaped rather like a tortoise, with one face plane and the other domed, while the flake shows the scars of the preparatory work on one face and is plane on the other. It is named for Levallois- Perret, a suburb of Paris, where such artifacts were first discovered. The Levallois technique was known from the Acheulian period and was employed by certain late Lower Paleolithic hand-ax makers, and throughout the Middle Paleolithic by some Mousterian communities. It lasted into the Upper Paleolithic of the Levant, and in the Epi Levalloisian industries of Egypt.

WHAT IS THE KNAPPING?

Working of stone by applying force to its surface – by percussion or pressure – to produce a tool. A knapper is one who manufactures stone artifacts, especially by chipping. This technique of striking flakes or blades from a hard, brittle rock, such as flint or obsidian, is done by means of short, sharp blows delivered with a hammer of stone, bone, or wood. Knapping was used to fashion stone tools and weapons, such as blades and arrowheads, in the Harappan culture of the Indus Valley and was also applied to making beads from agate and carnelian.

WHAT IS THE INDIRECT PERCUSSION?

A technique of stone-tool manufacture in which flakes are removed from a flint core in a way that causes less wasteful shatter of the material than direct percussion.

The hammer or hammerstone does not strike the flint but rather a wood, antler, or bone punch, usually with

a prepared edge, so that the manufacture of flakes is more controlled.

WHAT IS THE FLINT KNAPPING?

technique of striking flakes or blades from a large flint stone (core or nucleus) and the shaping of cores and flakes into tools. The most commonly used stone was flint (chert), a hard, brittle stone, commonly found as nodules in limestone areas, that breaks with a conchoidal fracture. Flint knapping began with the simple striking of one stone against another. Later methods include the use of antler and wooden strikers for both direct and indirect percussion, and bone and antler pressure-flaking tools.

WHAT IS THE DISCOIDAL NUCLEUS TECHNIQUE ?

A method of core knapping used during the Middle Paleolithic by which flaking was done until the core was too small to use. The Beaker People, in particular, made circular, oval, or oblong thin flakes of stone with this technique, which is very similar to the Levallois technique.