Flintknapping Making and Understanding Stone Tools

Name: Flintknapping Making and Understanding Stone Tools
Price: 13.68 USD
Availability: InStock
ISBN: 9780292790834

ISBN-10: 029279083X

ISBN-13: 9780292790834

Edition: 1994

Authors: John C. Whittaker

List price: $29.95

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Description:

Flintknapping is an ancient craft enjoying a resurgence of interest among both amateur and professional students of prehistoric cultures. In this new guide, John C. Whittaker offers the most detailed handbook on flintknapping currently available and the only one written from the archaeological perspective of interpreting stone tools as well as making them. Flintknapping contains detailed, practical information on making stone tools. Whittaker starts at the beginner level and progresses to discussion of a wide range of techniques. He includes information on necessary tools and materials, as well as step-by-step instructions for making several basic stone tool types. Numerous diagrams…

Book details

List price: $29.95
Copyright year: 1994
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Publication date: 5/1/1994
Binding: Paperback
Pages: 352
Size: 6.00" wide x 9.00" long x 1.20" tall
Weight: 1.298
Language: English

JOHN C. WHITTAKER is Professor of Anthropology at Grinnell College in Iowa.



Acknowledgments



Introduction


Using This Book


Learning to Knap



Flintknapping: Basic Principles


Flintknapping


Conchoidal Fracture


Properties of Material


Flakes and Cores



A Brief History of Flintknapping


Prehistory of Stone Tools


Recent "Stone-Age" People


Modern Knapping


Further Readings


Other Resources: Finding Other Knappers



Raw Materials


Stone Quality


Stone Materials


Heat-Treating


Collecting Material: Ethical and Practical Considerations



Safety


Proper Technique


Eyes


Hands


Other Body Parts


Lungs


Waste Disposal


Benefits



Hard-Hammer Percussion


Material and Equipment


Percussion-Flaking Principles: An Experiment


Percussion Flaking


Platforms


The Face of the Core


Terminations


Curvature


Starting a Core


Summary: Nine Essentials


Examples



Pressure Flaking


Tools


Raw Material


First Principles


Working Position


Beginning


Platform Preparation


Thinning


Notching


Other Pressure-Flaking Techniques


Summary: Six Essentials


Application: Small Triangular Points from the Southwest


Pressure-Flaking Problems


Patterned Pressure Flaking



Soft-Hammer Percussion and Bifaces


Definitions


Tools


Beginning


Soft-Hammer Principles and Results


Biface Thinning Flakes


Fracture Theories


The Blow Platforms


Biface Stages


Knapping Strategy and Other Considerations


Example: A Basic Biface


Biface Problems: Prehistoric Mistakes


Summary



Blades and Fluting


Blades


Platforms


Holding


Punches


The Blow Fluting


Example: Fluted Point



Using Stone Tools


Stone vs. Steel


Edges and Cutting


Making a Projectile Foreshaft


Going On



Archaeological Analysis of Stone Tools


Typology


Stone Tool Types and Change through Time


What People Did with Stones


Sources of Variation: Why Stone Tools Are Not All Alike


Analyzing Stone Tool Materials


Technology and What It Tells Us


Figuring Out Function


Questions of Style


Conclusions



Resources for Knappers


References


Index