The collection of the Bureau of Ethnology includes almost every type of stone implement or ornament, and as the investigations and explorations of the collaborators have extended over nearly all the eastern and central portions of the Mississippi valley, it furnishes a substantial basis for showing the geographic distribution of various forms of objects in use among the aboriginal inhabitants.
It has not been deemed advisable to utilize material contained in other collections. Should this be done there would be no reason for drawing upon one rather than another, and if it were once begun the examination would finally extend to every collection made from American localities, a study which, although perhaps desirable, would transcend the scope of the Bureau plans.
Much that has been published in regard to the distribution of relics in various portions of the country is of little value to a paper of this kind, since few of the objects are sufficiently illustrated or referred to any class in other than the most general terms; so that it is frequently impossible to determine the group in which a given article should be placed. Partly for this reason, partly because the primary purpose is description of a certain collection made in a definite way, little space is given to the descriptive work of predecessors in the field of archeology. The general results of previous work are, however, carefully weighed in the conclusions reached.
The ordinary division into chipped and pecked or ground implements has been adopted: the former including all such as are more easily worked by flaking, and the latter including those made from stone suitable for working down by pecking into form with stone hammers or by similar means. The system of nomenclature in general use has been retained, as it is now familiar to students of North American archeology, and, while not entirely satisfactory in some respects, is perhaps as good as can be devised in the present state of knowledge.
Careful study of the entire collection has failed to show the slightest difference in the form, finish, or material of implements from the same locality, whether found in mounds or graves or on the surface; hence no attempt is made to separate the two classes of objects. Allowance is to be made for the weathering of a surface specimen, but this is the only distinction.
It is not always easy to identify a stone, even with a fresh surface; in a weathered specimen it is often impossible. For this reason the material of which a specimen is made may not be correctly named; frequently the alteration due to exposure will change the appearance of a rock very much, and in such a case the best that can be done is to tell what it looks most like. The material of a majority of specimens however, or at least the classes of rock to which they belong, as granite, porphyry, etc., are correctly named; to give a more exact name would be possible only by the destruction or injury of the specimen. There are a few terms used which may be here explained.
“Compact quartzite” is a very hard, close-grained, siliceous rock, sometimes nearly a flint, and again closely approaching novaculite. “Greenstone” may be diorite or diabase, or it may be a very compact dark sandstone or quartzite so weathered that its nature can not be determined from superficial observation. “Argillite” refers to any slaty rock; it may be so soft as to be easily cut with a knife, or nearly as hard as quartzite. Usually it is greenish in color.
A comprehensive study of all available collections will no doubt modify materially the classification and system of types here presented.
The quotations from eminent anthropologists given below show the difficulties in the way of establishing a satisfactory system of types, or of assigning certain forms to particular localities. In most of these quotations the substance only of the author’s remarks is given.
According to Dr. E. B. Tylor, the flint arrows of the Dakota, the Apache, or the Comanche might easily be mistaken for the weapons dug up on the banks of the Thames;1 while cores of flint in Scandinavia and of obsidian in Mexico are exactly alike,2 and a tray filled with European arrowheads can not be distinguished from a tray of American ones.3 Prof. Otis T. Mason observes that the great variety of form in such weapons after they are finished is due partly to nature and partly to the workman’s desire to produce a certain kind of implement. All sorts of pebbles lie at the hand of the savage mechanic, none of them just what he wants. He selects the best.4 Perhaps the truth about the shape is that the savage found it thus and let it so remain.5
The state of things among the lower tribes which presents itself to the student is a substantial similarity in knowledge, arts, and customs, running through the whole world. Not that the whole culture of all tribes is alike—far from it; but if any art or custom belonging to a low tribe is selected at random, the likelihood is that something substantially like it may be found in at least one place thousands of miles off, though it frequently happens that there are large intervening areas where it has not been observed.6
On the whole, it seems most probable that many of the simpler weapons, implements, etc., have been invented independently by various savage tribes. Though they are remarkably similar, they are at the same time curiously different. The necessaries of life are simple and similar all over the world. The materials with which men have to deal are also very much alike; wood, bone, and to a certain extent stone, have everywhere the same properties. The obsidian flakes of the Aztecs resemble the flint flakes of our ancestors, not so much because the ancient Briton resembled the Aztec, as because the fracture of flint is like that of obsidian. So also the pointed bones used as awls are necessarily similar all over the world. Similarity exists, in fact, rather in the raw material than in the manufactured article, and some even of the simplest implements of stone are very different among different races.7
Tylor again says:
When, however, their full value has been given to the differences in the productions of the Ground Stone Age, there remains a residue of a most remarkable kind. In the first place, a very small number of classes, flakes, knives, scrapers, spear and arrow heads, celts, and hammers take in the great mass of specimens in museums; and in the second place, the prevailing character of these implements, whether modern or thousands of years old, whether found on this side of the world or on the other, is a marked uniformity. The ethnographer who has studied the stone implements of Europe, Asia, North or South America, or Polynesia, may consider the specimens from the district he has studied as types from which those of other districts differ, as a class, by the presence or absence of a few peculiar instruments, and individually in more or less important details of shape or finish, unless, as sometimes happens, they do not differ perceptibly at all. So great is this uniformity in the stone implements of different places and times, that it goes far to neutralize their value as distinctive of different races. It is clear that no great help in tracing the minute history of the growth and migration of tribes is to be got from an arrowhead which might have come from Polynesia, or Siberia, or the Isle of Man, or from a celt which might be, for all its appearance shows, Mexican, Irish, or Tahitian. If an observer, tolerably acquainted with stone implements, had an unticketed collection placed before him, the largeness of the number of specimens which he would not confidently assign, by mere inspection, to their proper countries, would serve as a fair measure of their general uniformity. Even when aided by mineralogical knowledge, often a great help, he would have to leave a large fraction of the whole in an unclassified heap, confessing that he did not know within thousands of miles or thousands of years where and when they were made.
How, then, is this remarkable uniformity to be explained? The principle that man does the same thing under the same circumstances will account for much, but it is very doubtful whether it can be stretched far enough to account for even the greater proportion of the facts in question. The other side of the argument is, of course, that resemblance is due to connection, and the truth is made up of the two, though in what proportion we do not know.8
While the several authors quoted do not fully agree, and some are even slightly self-contradictory, still, if the statements are to be taken at their face value, it would seem that efforts to make such classifications are mainly a waste of time.
It may be premised that in every class of implements there are almost as many forms as specimens, if every variation in size or pattern is to be considered; and these merge into one another imperceptibly. Not only is this the case with individual types, but the classes themselves, totally unlike as their more pronounced forms may be, gradually approach one another until there is found a medium type whose place can not be definitely fixed.
As space would be needlessly occupied by attempting to name each county, the area from which specimens have been obtained is, for convenience, divided into districts. These divisions are for use in this article only, and are not intended as archeologic districts.
In the tables given under each heading, the names of counties or districts show where the types described are obtained; the columns following show the number of specimens of each material mentioned in the collection of the Bureau.
Where a limited area only has been examined in any division, the name of the county is usually given; but where specimens of any kind have been obtained from different counties near one another, they are assigned to the district including those counties. The districts are as follows:
Northeastern: Between White and Mississippi rivers.
Southeastern: Between White and Washita rivers from Clarendon to Arkadelphia.
Southwestern: West of Washita river and south of Arkadelphia, including Bowie and Red River counties, Texas.
Central: From Dardanelles southward and eastward to the above limits.
Northeastern: Bordering Tennessee river east of Decatur.
Northwestern: Bordering Tennessee river west of Decatur. Coosa: Bordering Coosa river southward to and including Dallas county.
Tuscaloosa: Bordering the Tuscaloosa and Little Tombigbee, and extending a short distance below their confluence.
Miami valley: The country along the two Miami rivers, including Shelby county on the north and Madison and Brown counties on the east.
Scioto valley: South of Franklin county, including Adams and Lawrence counties.
Central: Including Union, Knox, Perry, and Franklin counties, and the area within these limits.
Southwestern: The counties bordering on either side of Mississippi river from La Crosse to Dubuque (Iowa).
Eastern: The portion between Lake Michigan, Lake Winnebago, and the Illinois line.
Southern: Dane and adjoining counties.
Keokuk: The southeastern corner of the state and adjacent portions of Illinois and Missouri.
Eastern: All the mountain district, with the extreme southwestern part of Virginia.
Western: From Mississippi river to and including the tier of counties east of the Tennessee.
Northern: The northern half of the interior portion.
Southern: The southern half of this portion.
Northwestern: North and west of a line from Lancaster to Columbia. As no other portion of the state has been examined under direction of the Bureau, only the name of the state is used herein, reference being always to this section.
Northwestern: The portion northwest of the Chattahoochee.
Southwestern: Area contiguous to the lower Chattahoochee and Flint river.
Savannah: The vicinity of the city of Savannah, where a large collection was gathered.
Northeastern: Between Kentucky, Big Sandy, and Ohio rivers.
Southeastern: From Estill and Cumberland counties to the Tennessee and Virginia state lines.
Central: Between Green and Ohio rivers, west of the last described districts.
Southern: From Green river southward and as far westward as Christian county.
Western: West of Green river and Christian county.
Western: West of Charlotte.
Central: Between Charlotte and Raleigh.
Southwestern: From the mouth of the Cumberland to Washington county, and thence to the Mississippi.
The various forms of implements will now be considered. As stated above, the names given the various articles are those by which they are usually known; but it may be well to define some of the terms used.
In the grooved axes, edge refers to the cutting portion; blade, to the part below the groove; poll or head, to that above the groove; face, to the wider or flat portion of the surface; side, to the narrower part; front, to that side farther from the hand, and back, to the side nearer the hand when in use.
In celts, the terms are the same, so far as they are applicable; blade referring to the lower half of the implement; that is, to the portion on which the cutting edge is formed.
The implements known as grooved axes seem to be of general distribution throughout the United States; being, so far can be learned from various writers, much more numerous east of Mississippi river than west of it. It must be remembered, however, that thousands of diligent collectors have carefully searched for such things in the east, while in the west little attention has been paid to them; consequently, deductions are not to be made concerning their relative abundance or scarcity, until further knowledge is gained. The same remark will apply to every form of aboriginal relic.
In the eastern and interior states, the grooved axes are far more abundant than the celts of the same size9, because as a rule only the larger implements of this class are grooved. All the ordinary varieties of axes and hatchets are found about Lake Champlain, by far the most abundant being celts, or grooveless axes.10
According to Adair and other early observers, the southern Indians had axes of stone, around the grooved heads of which they twisted hickory withes to serve as handles; with these they deadened timber by girdling or cutting through the bark.11 According to travelers of a later generation among the western Indians, similar implements were used on the plains to chop up the vertebræ of buffaloes, which were boiled to obtain the marrow.12
These statements, which might be multiplied, show that such objects are to be found widely scattered; none, however, give information more definite than that the axes are “grooved,” no reference being made to the shape of the ax or the manner of grooving.
The various modes of mounting axes and celts in handles are illustrated in the Smithsonian Report for 1879.
Stone axes were used in Europe by the Germans at as late a period as the Thirty Years’ war, and are supposed to have been used by the Anglo-Saxons at the battle of Hastings.13
Fig. 29.—Grooved ax, showing groove projections.
Axes having two grooves occur in considerable numbers in the pueblos of southwestern United States, but they are extremely rare elsewhere and unknown in most districts; as the objects are generally small, the utility of the second groove is not evident.
The arrangement of stone axes may be based upon the manner of forming the groove. In one class are placed those which in the process of making had a ridge left encircling the weapon, in which the groove was formed. This gives the ax greater strength with the same material. Usually the groove has been worked just deep enough to reach the body of the ax; that is, to such a depth that should the projections be ground off there would remain a celt-like implement (as shown in figure 29, of chlorite-schist, from Sullivan county, Tennessee). The axes of this class in the Bureau collection are shown in the following table:
| District. | A | B | C | D | E | F |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Tennessee | 9 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 1 | |
| Western North Carolina | 1 | 1 | ||||
| Central North Carolina | 1 | 1 | ||||
| Savannah, Georgia | 4 | 1 | ||||
| Butler county, Ohio | 1 | 1 | ||||
| KEY: A = Greenstone. B = Argillite. C = Sienite. D = Granite. E = Schist. F = Quartzite. |
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In the second class the groove is formed by pecking into the body of the ax after the latter is dressed into shape; in this pattern a regular continuous line from edge to poll would touch only the margins of the groove, leaving it beneath. An apparent medium between the two is sometimes seen, in which there is a projection on the lower side of the groove only; this is due, usually, to dressing the blade down thinner after the implement was originally worked to a symmetric outline. By continuous or long use the edge of the ax becomes broken or blunted and requires sharpening, and in order to keep the proper outline to make the tool efficient, it is necessary to work the blade thinner as it becomes shorter. No such change is required in the poll, consequently a projection is formed where originally there was no trace of one.
Fig. 30.—Grooved ax, showing pointed edge.
There are different methods of finishing the ax, which may appear with either form of groove. The poll may be worked into the shape of a flattened hemisphere, may be flat on top, with the part between the groove and the top straight, convex or concave, or may be worked to a blunt point, with straight or concave lines to the groove. The blade may taper from the groove to the edge, with straight or curved sides, which may run almost parallel or may be drawn to a blunt-pointed edge. This latter form is probably due to breaking or wearing of the blade, which is reworked, as shown in figure 30, of granite, from Boone county, Missouri.
There are a very few specimens, as noted below, in which the ax gradually increases in width from the poll to the edge; but such specimens seem to be made of stones which had this form approximately at the beginning, and were worked into such shape as would give a suitable implement with the least labor.
In nearly every instance the groove of an ax with a groove projection extends entirely around with practically the same depth, and the blade of the ax has an elliptical section. There are, however, a few with the back flattened; and while many of the second division may be similar in section, and in having the groove extend entirely around, yet in this class are to be placed nearly all of those only partly encircled by a groove or showing some other section than the ellipse.
Fig. 31.—Grooved ax, showing groove entirely around.
Fig. 32.—Grooved ax, slender, showing groove entirely around.
With these exceptions, the second class of grooved stone axes comprises seven groups, which may be described and tabulated as follows:
A. Grooved entirely around, elliptical section, polls dressed in any of the ways given above; three or four have the blunt-pointed edge (figure 31, of granite, from Bradley county, Tennessee).
| District. | A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Southwestern Illinois | 1 | 1 | 1 | ||||||
| Eastern Tennessee | 4 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 15 | 4 | 1 | ||
| Central North Carolina | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Western North Carolina | 2 | 2 | |||||||
| Central Arkansas | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Ross county, Ohio | 1 | ||||||||
| Green River, Kentucky | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Northeastern Kentucky | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Kanawha valley, West Virginia | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |||||
| Keokuk district, Iowa | 1 | 1 | |||||||
| Savannah, Georgia | 1 | 2 | 6 | 3 | |||||
| Miami valley, Ohio | 2 | 5 | 1 | ||||||
| KEY: A = Greenstone. B = Granite. C = Diorite. D = Sandstone. E = Quartzite. F = Argillite. G = Slate. H = Sienite. I = Porphyry. |
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B. Long, narrow, and thin, giving a much flattened elliptical section. These are classed with axes on account of the grooves, although too thin and usually of material too soft to endure violent usage. The edges are nicked, striated, or polished, as though from use as hoes or adzes (figure 32, of argillite, from Bradley county, Tennessee).
| District. | A | B | C |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Tennessee | 18 | 1 | |
| Keokuk district, Iowa | 1 | ||
| Kanawha valley, West Virginia | 1 | ||
| Montgomery county, North Carolina | 1 | ||
| Western North Carolina | 1 | ||
| Butler county, Ohio | 2 | ||
| KEY: A = Granite. B = Argillite. C = Slate. |
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Fig. 33.—Grooved ax, showing grooved back.
Fig. 34.—Grooved ax, showing grooved back.
C. Grooved on both faces and one side; back hollowed, usually in a straight line the whole length; front drawn in from the groove to give a narrower edge (figures 33, of porphyry, from Brown county, Ohio, and 34, of granite, from Kanawha valley, West Virginia).
| District. | A | B | C | D |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Tennessee | 1 | 1 | ||
| Kanawha valley, West Virginia | 1 | 1 | ||
| Butler county, Ohio | 1 | |||
| Brown county, Ohio | 1 | |||
| KEY: A = Granite. B = Argillite. C = Sienite. D = Porphyry. |
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D. Same method of grooving; back is rounded, and may be in a straight or curved line the entire length, or a broken line straight in each direction from the groove. The type is illustrated by figure 35, of granite, from Keokuk, Iowa. This specimen is unusually wide and thin; generally the outlines are similar to those last described.
| District. | A | B | C |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eastern Tennessee | 5 | ||
| Butler county, Ohio | 2 | ||
| Keokuk district, Iowa | 1 | 1 | |
| KEY: A = Granite. B = Argillite. C = Sienite. |
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Fig. 35.—Grooved ax, showing rounded back.
E. Grooved like the last; same general form, except that the back is flat (figures 36, of sienite, from Brown county, Ohio, and 37, of granite, from Drew county, Arkansas).
| District. | A | B | C | D | E |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Miami valley, Ohio | 2 | 3 | 5 | ||
| Brown county, Ohio | 1 | ||||
| Keokuk district, Ohio | 1 | 1 | |||
| Brown county, Illinois | 1 | 2 | |||
| Eastern Tennessee | 2 | 2 | |||
| Kanawha valley, West Virginia | 4 | 1 | 2 | ||
| Savannah, Georgia | 1 | 1 | |||
| Northeastern Kentucky | 1 | ||||
| Licking county, Ohio | 1 | ||||
| KEY: A = Sandstone. B = Argillite. C = Granite. D = Sienite. E = Greenstone. |
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F. Grooved on both faces and one side, with both sides flat. There is only one of this form in the collection; it is of argillite, from Keokuk, Iowa.
G. Grooved on faces only, with both sides flat (figure 38, of granite, from Keokuk, Iowa). There are from the same place one of porphyry, one of argillite, and three of sienite. This and the preceding form seem peculiar to that locality.
Fig. 36.—Grooved ax, showing flattened curved back.
Fig. 37.—Grooved ax, showing flattened straight back.
There are a few exceptional forms which are not placed with those just given, since they may have some features common to all except the Keokuk type, while in other respects they differ from all. Among them are some entire-grooved or grooved only on the two sides and one face; the general outline may correspond with some of the regular forms, but one face is curved from poll to edge, while the other is straight or nearly so (figure 39, of granite, from Wilkes county, North Carolina). This specimen has a depression, as if worn by the end of a handle, on the straight face at the lower edge of the groove.
None of this form are long enough for hoes, and although they may have been used for axes and hatchets, their shape seems to indicate use as adzes. Besides the one figured there are two from Savannah, Georgia; three from eastern Tennessee, one with a slight groove and very deep side notches; and three from western North Carolina, two of them entire-grooved with groove projections.
Fig. 38.—Grooved ax, Keokuk type.
Fig. 39.—Grooved ax, showing adze form.
Another unusual form, which may come under any of the foregoing figures, has the groove crossing the implement diagonally, in such a way as to cause the blade to incline backward (figure 40, of granite, from Carter county, Tennessee). Besides the specimen illustrated, this form is also represented by one of granite from northwestern North Carolina with projection for groove; two of argillite from southwestern Tennessee; one, widest at edge, from Savannah, Georgia; one from Ross county, Ohio; and two of granite, highly polished, grooved on faces and one side, with backs flat, from Kanawha valley, West Virginia.
Of the axes wider at the edge than at any point above (of which the specimen illustrated in figure 41, of granite, from a grave at Kingsport, Tennessee, may be taken as a type,) there are one of diorite from Kanawha valley, West Virginia, which seems to have been of ordinary pattern but broken and redressed to its present form; and from Savannah, Georgia, one of uniform taper with diagonal groove, and one widening irregularly until the blade is fully twice the width of the poll.
Fig. 40.—Grooved ax, showing diagonal groove.
Fig. 41.—Grooved ax, showing wide edge.