Table Of ContentLithic Technology in the Middle Potomac
River Valley of Maryland and Virginia
Lithic Technology in the Middle Potomac
River Valley of Maryland and Virginia
by
Wm Jack Hranicky, RPA
Diredor
Virginia Rockalt Survey
McCary FluteeI Point Survey
Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
Library of Congress Саtаlоgiпg-in-РubIiсаtiоп Data
Hranicky, Wm. Jack (William Jack)
Lithic technology in the middle Potomac River Valley of Maryland and Virginia/by
Wm. Jack Hranicky
р. ст.
Includes bibIiographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4613-5159-7 ISBN 978-1-4615-0615-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1007/978-1-4615-0615-7
1. Indians of North America-Virginia-Antiquities. 2. Indians of North
America-Maryland-Antiquities. З. Indians of North American-Potomac River
Valley-Antiquities. 4. Stone implements-Potomac River Valley. 5. Potomac River
Valley-Antiquities. 1. Тitle.
EV78.v7 Н729 2002
975.2'01-dc21
2002022604
ISBN 978-1-4613-5159-7
©2002 Sргiпgег Sсiепсе+Вusiпеss Media New York
Originally pubIished bYKluwer Academic/Plenum PubIishers, New York in 2002
Softcover reprinl of Ihe hardcover 1s l edilion 2002
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Acknowledgments
The author thanks the following for allowing collections to be research on the prehistory of the Potomac River valley of
photographed, providing information about collections, and Maryland, West Virginia, and Virginia. These efforts were
discussing general information for the text. They are: Charles truly appreciated by the author.
W. Merry, Howard A. MacCord, Sr., Michael F. Johnson,
Tyler Bastian (see Chronology section), the late Charles A. The Fairfax Archaeological Survey collections were used to
Pettit, Vic Jenkins, Scott Silsby (see Experimental supplement the study collections. Their field surveys were
Archaeology section), James Sorenson, Elizabeth Vance and performed by Michael F. Johnson and in some cases,
Larry Vance, Doug Dillinger, Dennis C. Curry, Kathy Butts, volunteers of the Archeological of Virginia. Access to these
Jeffrey P. Tottenham, Stephen Isreal, Mark S. Kelly, Dan collections is greatly appreciated by the author. Another
Isgrig, W. C. Nye, John and Violet Eicholtz, Harry A. contribution to this study was made by Ambassador George
Jaeger, Theodore R. Reinhart, William A. Thompson, Jr., McGhee of Middleburg, Virginia. He provided the author
Garland Stanton, Brian Station, Bart Quillin, David Dickson, with a point collection that will eventually be housed in the
Steve Lavagnino, Clinton Gurley, Jerry and Sandy Sherman, Alexandria Archaeology Museum in Alexandria, Virginia.
John M. Selmer, F. Kirk Drier, Errett Callahan and Daniel
Abbott, (see Experimental Archaeology section), Jeffry Special thanks to Ronald G. Orr of the Maryland
Tottenham (see Bifaces and Knives section) Patrick Keefe, Archaeological Conservation Laboratory located at the
Michael E. Barber, Edward Bottoms, Bernard Means, Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum in Calvert County,
Michael D. Petraglia, Jack Cresson (see Experimental Maryland. He provided an insight to Maryland's
Archaeology section), Barry C. Kent, D. J. Winkler and archaeological collections, including helping in recording
Jerome H. Winkler, Spencer Geasey, Ambassador George artifacts for this publication. The Spencer Geasey and Charles
McGhee, the late John Nichols, Ronald G. Orr, Teresa Pettit collections are located there, and some of their artifacts
Preston (and her father George Erwin Bray), Isabella Brown were used in this study. Pettit numbered all his artifacts and
(Pamunkey Museum), Stuart MacIntyre, Dan Guzy, and R. maintained a log of where each artifact was found. His
C. Printz. collection now belongs to the Maryland Historic Trust.
Special thanks to Rodney M. Peck who has provided R. C. Printz left is collection on display at the Herndon
information for several books. He has been of tremendous Historical Society. It now is housed at the Fairfax County
assistance on the Paleo indian Period, especially providing Archaeological Survey. Numerous specimens from his
Cumberland points and information for publication. As part of collection are presented. Another source is the collections of
this study, Gary Fogelman (Indian Artifact Magazine) Hugh V. Stabler. He worked with Smithsonian archaeologists
provided broken bannerstones from Pennsylvania. See during the 1930-50s on sites in the Potomac River valley, and
Miscellaneous Tools/Implements section. even made trips to the Plains states to do volunteer work.
For ethnographic data and artifacts, thanks to Raymond K. Of special assistance were Robert A. George, John Nugen,
Dabbs, Sonny Wells, John Selmer, Thomas Zane Summers, Harry Spencer, and Stephen Miller of the Armed Forces
George E. Bray, and Eugene M. Hayes, Jr. Radiobiology Research Laboratory (AFRRI) in Bethesda,
Maryland. The irradiation of jasper and rhyolite samples
Keith Egloff of Virginia's Department of Historic Resources provided insights into lithic distributions and usage. Special
provided DHR radiocarbon files and numerous sources of thanks to Isabelle Brown at the Pamunkey Museum for
archaeological information that helped make this publication showing the author their collections. And, Daniel Abbott
possible. Thanks to him and the DHR. (Nanticoke) for providing insights to Indian ways.
Dan Guzy, an engineer by profession, has made a study of Of special thanks to Charles McNett who provided early
MPRV fish weirs and his comments for this publication were academic training, Robert Stephenson who fostered an
greatly appreciated. archaeological interest in the area, and Howard MacCord who
provided opportunities to work in the area and elsewhere in
Special thanks to local state and county agencies and local Virginia.
museums. These are: Fairfax County Archaeological Survey,
Alexandria Archaeology Museum, Smithsonian Institution,
Fairfax County Park Authority, and Virginia Department of
Historic Cultural Resources.
And, thanks to the able and most helpful assistance of various
members of the Archeological Society of Maryland, Inc.,
Archeological Society of Virginia, Council of Virginia
Archaeologists, and West Virginia Archeological Society.
Numerous amateur archaeologists and local artifact collectors
have assisted the author during the last 25 years in promoting
site recording, artifact identifications, and other scholarly
Pamunkey Museum, King William County, Virginia.
-v-
Foreword
Interest in the prehistoric inhabitants of the Potomac River Valley goes back centuries. The first known European to
ascend the river any distance, Captain John Smith, was in part interested in collecting information on native lifeways
along the river. And the prehistoric stone artifacts littering the river's floodplain piqued the curiosity of the region's
settlers since at least the seventeenth century. This interest in the Potomac's prehistoric past continues today, and Wm.
Jack Hranicky's volume, Lithic Technology in the Middle Potomac River Valley of Maryland and Virginia, is a
welcome addition to the small but now growing corpus of published literature on the study area. In this brief forward I
would like to try and put this new publication in the context of our collective thinking, both past and present, on the
archaeology of the Potomac River Valley.
This important new book joins a greater stream of thought on the prehistory
....
of the Potomac River Valley. The earliest scholarly endeavors to uncover
this past date to the last two decades of the nineteenth century. Around that
THE time individuals working out of the Smithsonian .Institution and a sister
agency, the Bureau of American Ethnology, along with other
ARTBROPDLDGIST
nonprofessional archaeologists residing in or near that city began to
collaborate on creating an understanding of Potomac Valley prehistory. The
newly formed Anthropological Society of Washington often served as a
venue for such deliberation on local prehistory. A symposium held by that
organization in 1889 probably represents the first systematic effort to
describe the then known prehistoric past of the region.
Early issue (Vol. II, No.4, 1889) of the American Anthropologist
that was published monthly by the Anthropological Society of
Washington. Now it is published by the American Anthropological Association.
Out of this early interest came the research question that would thrust the
Potomac River Valley onto the national stage. Thomas Wilson, of the
Smithsonian Institution's Department of Antiquities, had suggested a link
between artifacts being recovered in the District of Columbia along a
tributary of the Potomac River and what were then purported to be
Paleolithic implements simultaneously being recovered in other parts of the
country. William Henry Holmes of the Bureau of Ethnology would use
these same implements from within Washington, DC to effectively crush the notion of such a deep antiquity both here
and elsewhere. His research on this issue eventually produced the first published book focusing for the most part on the
Potomac River Valley. That 1897 publication, carrying the imprimatur of the Fifteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of
American Ethnology, would become a landmark in both local and national archaeology.
As many of these early pioneers in Potomac archaeology passed on or turned to other interests at the turn of the
twentieth century, another new and active cadre of archaeologists stepped in to further our knowledge of local
prehistory. The honor roll is long, including such dedicated souls as David Bushnell, Alice Ferguson, William Graham,
Karl Schmitt, Robert Stephenson, T. Dale Stewart, Howard MacCord, Art Johnson, Carl Manson, Richard Slattery,
and Richard Stearns, just to name a few. It was these individuals and others like them that would begin the task of
patiently expanding our knowledge of regional prehistory. A very few of these individuals made a living at that task.
Recompense for most was little more than a chance to make a contribution to our knowledge of the river's former
inhabitants. To this day regional archaeology remains dependent on the perseverance of such folks.
More help, however, soon arrived as two local universities retained archaeologists on their faculties who developed an
interest in Potomac Valley archaeology. William Gardner and Charles W. McNett, Jr., of Catholic University and
American University respectively, formed the Potomac River Archaeology Survey in the late 1960s to further our
knowledge of local prehistory. They set out to survey existing collections and trained a corps of graduate students as
they excavated at a number of sites along the river's shore. These efforts, along with the labor of a host of other
individuals and the Archeological Societies of both Virginia and Maryland, moved us toward an even better
understanding of the past.
-vii -
As we approached the last quarter of the twentieth century, however, change was on the horizon. It is sad that interest
in Potomac prehistory for a while seemed to wane somewhat. Many archaeologists who had once worked here turned
to other interests. Historical archaeology, the archaeology of the colonial and post-Revolutionary past, at the same time
expanded greatly. The rectangular trowels of the historical archaeologists quickly began to outnumber the pointed
variety of Marshalltown still preferred by prehistorians. And as a result, research on the Potomac's prehistoric past
seemed to slow near the end of this last century.
I am happy to report this stagnation now appears to be lessening. We, in fact, appear to be seeing a renaissance of sorts
in the study of Potomac Valley prehistory. Stephen Potter's book on the region was a welcome addition. American
University recently conducted multi-year excavations at a late prehistoric site in the Potomac Piedmont. William
Gardner has been undertaking some interesting studies on or near Selden Island in this same part of the river. The
Maryland Historic Trust along with the Archeological Society of Maryland undertook important excavations in the
western watershed. Bob Wall continues his excavations in the upper Potomac Valley. Various other research
undertaken by cultural resource
management firms along the Washington,
DC waterfront is likewise bringing new
data to light. Their recovery of a very
unique Middle Woodland burial and new
information about the local ceramic
sequence is of particular note. Charles
McNett even reports he is in the final
stages of revising his long awaited
manuscript on Potomac Valley
prehistory.
Professor Joe Dent working on a square at
the Cactus Hill Site in Virginia. He was
- Fieldschool Director for American University
summer 2000 archaeology studies, which
included work at the site
And now we also have Hranicky's new
book on the archaeology of the Potomac River Valley. The strengths of this book will be immediately evident to all
who turn its pages. The volume is artifact based, focusing on the lithic technology of what is labeled the Middle
Potomac River Valley. This study area stretches from the confluence of the Shenandoah and the Potomac River to the
west downstream to Occoquan Creek on the Coastal Plain. Great use is made of various private artifact collections
along with those housed in local repositories. This is supplemented with the author's vast personal experience working
in the region. In the process interesting new ideas are offered on the interpretation of the lithic technology. Another
strong point of the book is that it crosses modern political boundaries. It is one of the few volumes today that is not
focused on only one side of the Potomac River. Readers who once worked in the Potomac River Valley, or who still
do, will find a refreshing family album sort of feel to its pages. All the characters are there (including the book's
author) who have worked so hard to bring the region's past to light. I invite you to come and join him for another look
at an old friend - Potomac River Valley prehistory.
Richard J. Dent
Director, Potomac River Archaeology Survey
American University, Washington, DC.
-viii-
Tribute to William Henry Holmes
William Henry Holmes (1846-1933) was born in Cadiz, Ohio into a farming family. While his life-time
devotion was art, he did not receive formal training in it. He did receive a teaching certificate in 1865 and
graduated from McNeedly Normal School in 1870. By chance in a Cadiz bookstore, he met a War Department
clerk who suggested to him that he should go to Washington
City to study art. He moved to the city in 1871 to study with the
painter Theodore Kaufmann. He soon met Mary Henry,
daughter of Joseph Henry, the first Secretary of the
Smithsonian. This led him to become a scientific illustrator for
the institution. Holmes actually lived in one of the Smithsonian's
towers. His skill made him numerous friends, namely Ferdinand
V. Hayden who had successfully lobbied Congress to establish
the United States Geological Survey of the Territories (became
the USGS). Holmes became an artist for the Survey. He worked
with Hayden in his 1872 survey of Yellowstone. During these
surveys, Holmes would be forever influenced by his visit to
Anasazi ruins in the San Juan Valley of New Mexico and
Arizona. Also, while working at Yellowstone, he noticed
worked nodules of obsidian, where he wrote: It occurred to [me]
that the various Indian tribes of the neighboring valleys had
probably visited this locality for the purpose of procuring
material for arrow points and other implements.
Photograph permission: Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC.
Holmes exhibited the romance of the past in America as seen by the Native Americans. He
lived in a time when he could actually see, talk to, and spend time with Native Americans
while the land was still theirs.
Holmes, with the assistance of William Jackson, took on the task of displaying a Puebloan cliff house for the
1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia. In 1879, he toured European museums and lived in the artist
colony in Munich. He returned to the U.S. and again worked for the USGS and
found himself out west. While working in this capacity, he was appointed
honorary curator of aboriginal pottery at the United States National Museum
(USNM). From 1880 to 1889, he published numerous collections of shell,
ceramic, and stone objects and worked throughout the country, especially the
Southwest. Under the Bureau of American Ethnology (BAE), he performed
archaeological investigations in the Mexico and Jamez Valley of New Mexico.
During times between investigations, he exercised his artwork abilities with
exhibits in New Orleans, Louisville, and Cincinnati. All of which produced over
30 publications.
Holmes earned his reputation the hard way by climbing mountains, mapping
unknown territories, and drawing antiquities from American prehistory. Later,
Ph.D.s from European universities would consult with him on the American
Indians and geology of America. He would combine this interest into a natural
history of archaeology.
In 1889, Powell appointed Holmes to take over the BAE's fieldwork. He would
then become involved in the question of America's Paleolithic. Holmes came up
against Frederick W. Putnam's (Salem Museum) so-called American paleoliths.
He differed with Thomas Wilson (Smithsonian) about these artifacts.
To settle the argument, he selected a site on Piney Branch in Washington City that
contained artifacts in what was considered as being Tertiary and Cretaceous ages. Holmes' excavation (1889-
1890) established that the Cretaceous was the age of the gravels at the site. He argued the artifacts were recent
-ix-
and virtually started the end of the great American debate over paleolithics. However, not everyone was
convinced; such as Charles C. Abbott of the Trenton gravels fame who was unconvinced by the Piney Branch
evidence. Holmes would eventually discredit Abbott's Trenton Paleoliths. The Piney Branch site may be
considered the beginning of American archaeology as it is today.
Holmes' philosophy was to view observations as the consequence of natural history. The observation became
the abstraction that he used in his methodology; archaeology was to him a science. For him, science was based
on empirical observations. These observations were frequently made on Native Americans, which allowed him
to deduce prehistoric peoples' lives and their tools.
Holmes' path would cross with Franz Boas of the Field Museum in Chicago. He out-did, with help of others,
Boas in competing for the job of curator, and their relationship would reverberate over the next three decades.
He still continued to complete his research in the Potomac River valley, which climaxed with the publication
of Stone Implements of the Potomac-Chesapeake Tidewater Province in 1897. This work would award him
with the Loubat Quinquennial Prize - a prize of$I,OOO. While his work in Chicago was rewarding, such as a trip
to the ruins of the Yucatan, in 1897 he would return to Washington City as head curator of the Department of
Anthropology of the USNM. Under this position, he would formulate and publish Aboriginal Pottery of the
Eastern United States. Once into the 20th century, Holmes would become the chief(not choosing director's title)
of the BAE. He oversaw the compilation of the two-volume work entitled Handbook of American Indians
North of Mexico in 1907 and 1910. The author was Frederick Webb Hodge. Another one of Holmes' major
contributions to American archaeology was his role in the passage of the Antiquities Act of 1906. Nonfederal
archaeologists were upset by the Act because they resented their practice being regulated by the Smithsonian. He
greatly increased the USNM's collections and established the Department of Physical Anthropology and
appointed Ales Hrdlicka to head it. This appointment would lead to a fruitful period in American anthropology.
From this time on, Holmes would publish little and had little time for fieldwork. But he still was recognized for
his work in archaeology. In 1905, he was elected into the National Academy of Sciences. In 1910, he retired as
head of the BAE and became head of the Division of Anthropology and became curator of the American Gallery
of Art. He would write his substantial works entitled Handbook of Aboriginal American Antiquities in 1919.
He received another Loubat Prize for this effort.
Holmes would be party to events that would brand anthropologists as being spies. Boas gained control of the
American Anthropologist and subsequently published a letter called The Nation in 1919 in which he accused
an unnamed anthropologists as being spies. This led to Boas' resignation from the American Anthropological
Association. After which, Holmes resigned from the USNM and returned once again to art - he helped
establish the journal Art and Archaeology. He would continue for the remainder of his life at the Gallery. On
April 20, 1933, he died. William Henry Holmes and his wife are buried in Rock Creek Cemetery in
Washington, DC - just two miles from the Piney Branch site that launched his career.
Photograph of Holmes' Family plot in Rock Creek Cemetery, Washington, DC.
No matter whether archaeologist or Native American, their lives become the buried past. We are only
temporary custodians of humanity's material cultural remains
-x-
Preface
The author back in highschool was fascinated with de Soto's meeting
with various southeastern Indians. Later, Catlin's travels sparked the
interest of what it must have been like to meet Native Americans
before the European invasion that nearly destroyed thousands of
cultures. The study of early explorers led to the author's life-time
study of prehistory, namely the American Indian's history.
Based on this interest, the following publication is a study of lithic
technology as found in the Middle Potomac River Valley (MPRV).
The archaeological focus of a single geographical area offers an
opportunity to present projectile point typology as a microtechnology
even though some of the types have widespread distributions. As for
macrotechnology, the area is an ideal study opportunity for new large tool data because of the lack of
published data. The MPRV presents a physical artifact collection for lifeways in a snap-shot view of
prehistory. Or, in other words, what technology(s) did the Indians use while living in the valley along the
Potomac River's fall line. The Indian's toolkit contained numerous tools, including the projectile point, axe,
celt, drill, and knife implements; of which, some are unique; others are Panindian.
Concern with history (past experiences) may be a genetic code in the human race - one that is directly used for
survival and is stored in an individual's subconscious memory; all individuals remember their past experiences
- their history. It is frequently related to survival. This memory, when shared in a social group or society, is
called the collective memory and is often manifested in prehistoric societies as folklore, traditions,
ceremonies, etc. Contemporary, as well as nonliterate, societies frequently use the collective memory as social
norms or acceptable behaviors, or simply justification for
the rationale and control of various human activities.
Another way of describing a collective memory is history
(oral traditions), which is a set of known events in time
and space for any given society. Consequences of specific
local events are basically irrelevant in the total history of
humanity. Of course, some historians would argue
consequences cause changes in historical directions for
societies, but these are frequently based on SUbjective
appraisals and personal value systems of researchers. For
prehistory, we translate the Indians traditional past as
uncovered archaeologically. For lithic technology, these
traditions and behaviors are manifested in Indian toolkits
and the ways they used them.
Wm Jack Hranicky - Measuring Artifacts at the
Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum in Calvert County, Maryland.
As shown, always wear latex gloves when handling museum specimens.
This publication is the result of the author's work, investigation, artifact recording, and general archaeological
research in the Middle Potomac River Valley (MPRV) over the last 30 years. This study of stone tools and
implements was performed to:
-Update the current knowledge base of MPRV archaeology
-Provide new data and interpretations on MPRV lithic technology
_Provide a single-source for published MPRV references
_But mainly, provide a study on:
.:>History of MPRV archaeology (people and sites)
.:>MPRV environmental influences (Indian utilization)
.:>Basic MPRV artifacts (classification and typology)
.:>Tool usage by Indians (living archaeology).
-xi-
This publication presents a sample of MPRV artifacts from the arrowhead to the axe. It shows lithic usage for
these tools and illustrates how they were used in the Indians' society. These tools are organized
chronologically and contrasted to various artifacts and time periods found elsewhere. All of which leave this
publication as a humble beginning for the 21 century in Potomac River valley archaeology.
st
Three principal stones were used in the MPRV, namely quartzite, greenstone, and rhyolite. These materials
were tested scientifically in the study with methods that are suggested as making lithic identifications and
comparisons easier. They provide the means for standardization in archaeology.
A chronological framework is presented for the
MPRV that is based on the Classic Paleoindian -
Archaic - Woodland (PAW) model used by eastern
archaeologists. The PAW is discussed with
technology as its major focus. The framework is
also used in the Projectile Point section that
incorporates environmental conditions from the
MPRV's prehistory.
Example of Potomac River Valley Urbanization. MPRV
archaeological site are rapidly disappearing; many of
them have had little or no archaeological investigations.
Overall, the classification of points and tools is
based on empirical observation from which analyses
were subject to the author's experience with the
prehistoric cultural framework of the Potomac River valley. Typology is presented as a morphological
standard based on a collection of physical attributes that are found on MPRV points.
Prehistorically, the Middle Potomac River valley is disappearing.
Housing, shopping malls, colleges, industrial complexes, and
numerous other urbanization projects have destroyed, and are
continuing to destroy prehistoric sites. Some sites do get excavated,
but most never see an archaeologist's trowel.
Claude Moore Colonial Farm Reconstruction
on Turkey Run, Fairfax County, Virginia
This study captures MPRV archaeology as it existed during the late
20th century. It presents a summary of current archaeological
knowledge with the expectation that more work will be done.
While most important, Native American history dates over 10,000
years. They left the area more-or-less as they found it. The Colonial Period sees the beginnings of a super
culture, which until recently exploited the earth's resources with little care about the future. The history of the
river valley comes from the past and belongs to the future. Hopefully, the landscape can survive humanity.
Potomac View of Rosslyn, Virginia. The modern age, 2000 version, stands on prehistoric sites along the Potomac River
- a consequence of history. The 2100 version will stand on these historic sites, a consequence of history and so
forth ... We are our history.
Wm Jack Hranicky
Registry of Professional Archaeologists (RPA)
-xii -
