From REWILD.info Field Guide, the free Field Guide To Rewilding
The term knapping (or flintknapping) describes the practice of removing flakes from a stone in order to produce stone tools such as knives, arrowheads, and spear points. Aboriginal or "abo" knapping describes the oldest method of knapping (using hammerstones and antler as percussion and pressure flaking tools) as opposed to modern knapping (using copper tools).
- For main article, see Knapping tools
[edit] Primitive Tools
[edit] Hammerstones
Knappers use hammerstones of various sizes and hardness as hard percussion tools generally in the initial stages of spalling, such as when breaking into a nodule for the first time, or in the initial bifacial reduction process. Knappers may also commonly use hammerstones to produce flakes (also called spalls) from which they can then make points. Hammerstones generally produce a flatter flake than antler billets, but a good knapper can produce nearly identical flakes with either hammerstones or billets.
[edit] Billets
Knappers use the crown end of an antler (the end attached to the skull) as a hammer after rounding with an abrader. Antler billets shown include deer, elk, and moose. Knappers generally use antler billets after the initial hard hammerstone reduction process, when platforms have a more refined shape. Flakes produced generally have a slight curvature. Knappsers use this characteristic to help form a lenticular shaped point.
[edit] Pressure Flakers
Knappers use pressure flaking to set up platforms for percussion and also on the final stages of certain points to impart a sequential flake pattern or to thin smaller points. Pressure flaking produces much smaller than those removed with percussion. Pressure flakers show here include deer and elk tines, some with a leather and wood handle.
[edit] Notching Tool
Knappers can use antler notching tools to produce the notches in points in order to haft (wrap with a binding) the point to a shaft in order to make a knife, spear or arrow.
[edit] Modern Tools
According to some, modern copper tools present "an excellent simulation of the antler and soft hammer stones used by the ancients."[1] Examples even exist in the archaeological record of indigenous knappers using tools made from naturally-occurring copper.[1]
[edit] Copper boppers
These soft percussion tools provide a metal counterpart to antler billets. Construction usually consists of a copper cap, often made from plumbing materials, hammered into a rounded shape, filled with lead, and mounted on a wood or metal handle.
- See article, Making copper boppers
[edit] Copper pressure flakers
Modern knappers sometimes use these pressure tools as a modern counterpart to "abo" flakers made from antler tines. The business end usually consists of heavy-gauge copper wire like copper ground wire, hammered to hardness, filed to a point, and mounted on a handle.
- See article, Making copper pressure flakers
[edit] Hard percussion
[edit] Spalling
The knapper removed this large spall with a hammerstone using a slow, straight-in blow with follow through. The red circles indicate the impact point.
[edit] Spall impact
In this image, the knapper has refitted the spall flake back into its scar in order to show the point of impact (indicated by the red circle) on the platform (the beveled edge used as impact point for percussion or pressure flaking).
[edit] Soft percussion
[edit] Republican strike point
The knapper detached this flake with an antler billet. Red circles indicate the point of impact.
[edit] Soft percussion flake
Notice the curvature and thinness of the resultant flake. This result represents a typical example of billet percussion.
[edit] Direct freehand percussion with billet
Direct Percussion with Billet
Use a steady and consistent swing when doing freehand percussion. Hold the stone loosely, and do not let the hand drop upon impact (a common mistake). Some people prefer to do percussion with the point resting on the leg pad.
[edit] Pressure Flaking
[edit] Leveraging
Notice how the hand holding the stone locks into the inside of the left leg, and the right hand with the pressure flaker pushes down onto the right leg. This allows you to help compound the leverage by squeezing in with both legs.
[edit] Close-up
The tip of the flaking tool should rest on the beveled edge (platform), then push with considerable force straight in (called loading), next use an outward snapping motion with a follow through push to detach the flake.
[edit] Holding technique
Pressure Flaking Holding Technique
Notice the placement of the fingers holding the preform in position using only the edge. This prevents snapping the point in two by holding too much pressure down in the center. You can use this same hold for notching.
[edit] Notching
Use a sharpened antler for notching. Take a small flake from one face on the edge, then turn the point over on the opposite face. Abrade the notch slightly before removing each flake. Using the same notch, push in and then downward, similar to pressure flaking. Flip over and repeat until you have reached the desired depth. Taking several small flakes works better than removing one large one, which can lead to folding the point across the notches.
[edit] Clovis technology
[edit] Overshot flake
Clovis technology used overshot flakes extensively as a means of thinning a biface with just a few flakes, while also leaving it fairly flat.
The picture shows the detached overshot flake and the outlined area where it came from on the biface. An overshot or outrepasse, initiates on one edge and expands to cross the face completely and remove a portion of the opposing edge, usually a square edge that the knapper has not refined yet.
The arrow indicates the direction of travel of energy, while the circles indicate the impact point of the antler billet. With this technique Clovis knappers could thin an average size biface with just several flakes. Few knappers today can consistently produce true overshot flakes.
[edit] Clovis style biface
A replica Clovis style biface showing the wide spacing and some overshots that typtefy that culture. The knapper worked this Niobrarite material with an antler billet.
[edit] Nodule reduction
[edit] Georgetown nodule
You can work a whole nodule down into a biface from which you can then make a point, or you can remove spalls from the nodule to produce points from, or you can do a combination of these, with removing some spalls and then making a larger biface from the remaining core. How you choose to work a nodule will depend on the nodule itself as to how the reduction process proceeds.
[edit] Spalls from Georgetown nodule
The knapper used a smaller hammerstone to remove these spalls from a nodule of Georgetown (Texas material). You could make several points from a nodule.
[edit] Georgetown Biface
A spall worked down with a smaller antler billet percussion into a thinned biface (flaked on both sides). The knapper can now work the biface further using pressure flaking.
[edit] Georgetown Preform
The biface after the knapper has shaped and thinned it with pressure flaking and before notching.
[edit] Finished point
The finished, notched point.
[edit] Sources
Attribution
- Original Article & Photos by Rick Hamilton at his site reposted here with permission.
References
- ^ a b Ancient Art, Modern Fun by Tom Sterling
