Fig. 263.—Flake, chipped for scraper.
Frequently the large flat spalls knocked from blocks or chunks of flint in shaping them, or in obtaining pieces to work, are of such form that very little additional labor converts them into serviceable scrapers, knives, spears, or arrows. A number of such pieces are found in the collection. These, however, are not considered in the flakes now to be described:
A. Edges bluntly chipped (from the concave side) for use as scrapers. They may or may not have notches for attachment to a handle. An example from Kanawha valley, West Virginia, is shown in [figure 263]. Others come from southwestern Arkansas; Kanawha valley; Miami and Scioto valleys, and central Ohio.
B. Trimmed only enough to give a general leaf shape, the faces being left unchanged; for use as knives or arrowheads, most of them being exceedingly small; notched, or with continuous edges. This form is represented by the specimen from Licking county, Ohio, illustrated in [figure 264]. It is found in central Ohio; northeastern Arkansas; Coosa valley, Alabama; eastern Tennessee; and western North Carolina.
Fig. 264.—Flake, chipped for knife or arrow head.
Fig. 265.—Flake, slender, probably for lancet.
C. Long, slender, with three or four facets on one face, caused by others having been struck off above. The edges are as keen as broken glass, and the points are usually quite sharp. In a great many the points have been worked off by fine, secondary chipping. When this is done, it is always at the end which was struck in knocking off the flake. In some cases it may be due to the shattering effects of the blow; but in many specimens the evidence is plain that it was done afterward for the purpose of making a sharper point. Some flakes of this kind have notches for attachment to a shaft, probably for arrows; such specimens, however, are without the secondary chipping, and the notches are at the end opposite the one struck.
A good example, shown in [figure 265], is from Kanawha valley, and there are others from the same locality, as well as from Miami valley, Ohio; and Union county, Mississippi.