WEBVTT - Ep. 34: The Folsom Site - The Unsolved Mystery of Fluted Stone (Part 4) 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:07.160 M a guy that introduced me to the Folsome site. 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:10.160 He couldn't get excited about certain cultures because they used 0:00:10.160 --> 0:00:13.480 a lot of junk stone and their points recruited. In course, 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:17.480 the guy had been an engineer. He wiped the Folsome point. 0:00:17.680 --> 0:00:20.080 To him, it was like, no, that's a good people. 0:00:21.600 --> 0:00:26.200 His attitude though. This week on the Bargrease podcast, we're 0:00:26.280 --> 0:00:28.880 on our fourth and final episode in our series on 0:00:28.920 --> 0:00:33.440 the Fulsome Archaeological Site, and we're talking about stone points. 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:38.040 We're in search of understanding the ancient, mysterious and difficult 0:00:38.159 --> 0:00:43.239 process of fluting stone. We'll discuss the radical design and 0:00:43.280 --> 0:00:46.880 the mechanics of these stone points and infer some stuff 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:50.080 about the culture of these people based on all that 0:00:50.159 --> 0:00:55.920 we have, these beautiful stone points that we call Fulsome points. 0:00:56.360 --> 0:01:00.800 Of all their material possessions, these stones are the only 0:01:00.840 --> 0:01:04.160 thing that have outlasted the erosive nature of time. Well 0:01:04.160 --> 0:01:08.039 be talking with a new guest, anthropologist, Devin Pettigrew, who 0:01:08.040 --> 0:01:10.880 will walk us through the design of these points and 0:01:10.920 --> 0:01:14.760 the history of addle Addles, and one last time will 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:18.440 tap into the knowledge of Dr David Meltzer and Steve Rinella. 0:01:19.000 --> 0:01:21.880 We dove in and went to the dad gum bottom 0:01:22.000 --> 0:01:25.120 of the river, and we're finally coming up for air 0:01:25.200 --> 0:01:28.679 as we'll discover the answer to our original question of 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:32.919 why does any of this matter? The flutes on these 0:01:32.959 --> 0:01:37.040 points don't play any music, but they paint an incredible 0:01:37.120 --> 0:01:42.640 picture of who these people were. I really doubt you're 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:45.039 gonna want to miss this one. If you think about 0:01:45.080 --> 0:01:48.760 like early Germanic flintlock rifles in the Americans, they were 0:01:49.120 --> 0:01:51.720 extremely well made. There was an art to them, and 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:53.680 they re graved them. They didn't have to do all 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:57.280 that stuff, but they could with fulsome they're just very 0:01:57.280 --> 0:02:01.360 concerned about, you know, making these points extremely well made. 0:02:01.600 --> 0:02:03.600 Somebody put a lot of extra time and that's and 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:14.840 they really needed to. My name is Clay Nukelem, and 0:02:14.919 --> 0:02:18.600 this is the Bear Grease Podcast where we'll explore things 0:02:18.639 --> 0:02:23.280 forgotten but relevant, search for insight and unlikely places, and 0:02:23.400 --> 0:02:27.040 where we'll tell the story of Americans who lived their 0:02:27.080 --> 0:02:31.800 lives close to the land. Presented by f HF Gear, 0:02:32.320 --> 0:02:37.040 American made purpose built hunting and fishing gear that's designed 0:02:37.040 --> 0:02:51.280 to be as rugged as the places we explore. On 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:54.600 this episode, we're gonna look into the technology and designed 0:02:54.639 --> 0:02:58.320 to the fulsome Stone Point. These points were first discovered 0:02:58.400 --> 0:03:01.840 in the wild Horse arroy oh in fulsome New Mexico, 0:03:02.000 --> 0:03:05.560 scattered amongst the remains of thirty two bison antiquous. If 0:03:05.560 --> 0:03:08.680 you've been listening to this series, you know all this stuff. 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.359 These bison were killed some ten thousand years ago by 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:16.680 ancient human hunters, some of the first Americans. The technology 0:03:16.720 --> 0:03:19.760 at this point was radical in terms of its engineering, 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:23.200 and the reasoning of the ancient hunters to employ this 0:03:23.360 --> 0:03:27.640 risky style of point is a mystery. All the experts 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:31.680 agreed the design has utilitarian function, but the reward of 0:03:31.720 --> 0:03:35.200 that function came with great costs, and some believe there 0:03:35.240 --> 0:03:38.400 was more to the point than just in the field performance. 0:03:38.840 --> 0:03:42.320 Was it cultural, was it spiritual? There was it the 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:45.880 tendency of early man, just like it is today to 0:03:46.040 --> 0:03:50.560 push engineering to the furtherest side of the pendulum before 0:03:50.640 --> 0:03:55.160 the system breaks. Will never know the full answer, but 0:03:55.280 --> 0:04:00.200 we're in search of why they fluted these points. I 0:04:00.240 --> 0:04:03.360 feel pretty good about what we've learned regarding the events 0:04:03.440 --> 0:04:07.120 of this ancient hunt that we've been dissecting. We've covered 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:09.200 a lot of ground while we've been in pursuit of 0:04:09.200 --> 0:04:13.160 our layman's PhD on Fulsome from George mcjunkan, the former 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:16.080 slave we found the site, to the speculation on how 0:04:16.120 --> 0:04:19.760 the kill went down to gourmet butchering, to who these 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:23.159 ancient people were and how they lived along the way 0:04:23.200 --> 0:04:25.719 we've been leaning on the inside of Steve Ronella Meat 0:04:25.760 --> 0:04:30.360 Eater is insight an ability to ask some interesting questions 0:04:30.720 --> 0:04:34.440 have helped open a broader vista on this subject. Here's 0:04:34.520 --> 0:04:39.080 Steve opening up our conversation on the uniqueness of the 0:04:39.120 --> 0:04:42.960 fulsome points and the inferences that can be made about 0:04:43.000 --> 0:04:50.560 these people because of their craftsmanship, the fineness of a 0:04:50.600 --> 0:04:53.160 fulsome point. It's the craftsmanship that goes into making a 0:04:53.200 --> 0:04:57.080 fulesome point where you make this like very perfect point. 0:04:57.240 --> 0:04:59.159 Every one of them kind of falls into a certain 0:04:59.200 --> 0:05:02.920 like dimensional characteristics, certain shape. You do something really hard 0:05:02.920 --> 0:05:05.080 to make like a point, and then you do something 0:05:05.160 --> 0:05:08.720 like knock these channel out of each face running the 0:05:08.839 --> 0:05:11.599 length of the point, which has a very high failure rate. 0:05:12.200 --> 0:05:14.960 So even people now like contemporary naverage to try to 0:05:14.960 --> 0:05:17.760 experience it. It's hard. It's like to make the thing 0:05:17.800 --> 0:05:21.240 and knock the thing out. Most are not gonna work. 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:26.240 Just a delicate seeming but probably very deadly thing and 0:05:26.440 --> 0:05:29.320 so finely wrought and from such perfect stone that I 0:05:29.360 --> 0:05:32.000 think that adds a lot to the mythology of the 0:05:32.000 --> 0:05:34.400 folsome hunter. And to demonstrate I mean, I used to 0:05:34.720 --> 0:05:37.279 be friends. He passed away, but a guy that introduced 0:05:37.279 --> 0:05:39.360 me to the Folsome site. His name was Tony Baker. 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:43.120 He come from a long line of anthropologists and arrowhead hunters. 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:47.120 He would talk about some cultures just the projectile points. 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:51.000 He didn't seem to like the culture. I don't mean 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:53.760 a way like judging them. He couldn't get excited about 0:05:53.760 --> 0:05:56.520 certain cultures because they use a lot of junk stone 0:05:56.960 --> 0:06:00.000 and their points where and their points were crude in course, 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:03.120 and he he was making insinuations about who they were, 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:05.960 the character they were. They weren't picky about the stone 0:06:06.000 --> 0:06:08.560 they used. They were sloppy. They would leave, you know, 0:06:08.800 --> 0:06:11.600 they would leave like like patentation on that they wouldn't 0:06:11.640 --> 0:06:14.159 clean every face, so sometimes they had like a like 0:06:14.200 --> 0:06:16.320 a patina to it. And he was just like dismissive, 0:06:16.440 --> 0:06:19.240 not like dismissive, like not the religion or the belief system. 0:06:19.360 --> 0:06:23.280 He just couldn't get excited about people that made that 0:06:23.520 --> 0:06:27.400 use cruddy stone to make a rather crude implement The 0:06:27.400 --> 0:06:32.600 guy had been an engineer. He liked the fulsome point 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:35.240 to him, it was like, no, that's a good people. 0:06:36.120 --> 0:06:39.120 What's kind of his attitude? You know? Think about if 0:06:39.160 --> 0:06:42.960 you use that same idea and projected into the future 0:06:43.320 --> 0:06:46.200 of what people would say about us. It's a judgment 0:06:46.200 --> 0:06:48.120 you make when you want when you're driving down the road, man, 0:06:48.360 --> 0:06:51.279 you see you know, you see a nice house, everything's organized, 0:06:51.320 --> 0:06:54.479 a nice beautiful garden, Like there's a boat, boat looks 0:06:54.560 --> 0:06:58.600 rigged up, ready to go. It looks an industrious person, 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:01.320 you know. And then you buy a place and everything's 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:06.000 all fallen down and in disrepair and junk everywhere. You 0:07:06.640 --> 0:07:10.760 most I'm not saying you most people make up old 0:07:10.920 --> 0:07:14.440 passing judgment about what that person's um. They're they're sort 0:07:14.480 --> 0:07:17.840 of like like how they feel about craftsmanship, how they 0:07:17.880 --> 0:07:22.520 feel about organization, how whether they're fastidious and tidy, you know, 0:07:22.720 --> 0:07:24.920 and and in a similar way, I look at that 0:07:24.960 --> 0:07:28.760 point and I'm like, holy cow, man, just a lot 0:07:28.960 --> 0:07:32.440 from that, just a beautiful point. Let's say someone somehow 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:37.000 anthropological techniques get very so sophisticated that we learned somehow 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:40.800 that the folesome hunters really yelled at their wives all 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:44.200 the time, terribly rude to their wives. I'd be like, 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:47.440 oh man, I didn't. That kind of goes against my impression. 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:50.880 Never mased on the projectile never never make your hero 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:53.080 staf you never want to meet your hero based on 0:07:53.160 --> 0:07:55.800 the projectile points. I find that very disappointed. Perhaps they 0:07:55.800 --> 0:07:59.160 were a little bit thuggish with their lives. It's a 0:07:59.320 --> 0:08:03.680 very real idea that how we manage our material things 0:08:03.720 --> 0:08:07.880 reflects some parts of our internal value system. Do you 0:08:07.920 --> 0:08:10.840 think that's fair? Do you think that we're coming to 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:14.560 accurate conclusions when we infer this much about these people 0:08:14.720 --> 0:08:18.240 from the craftsmanship of their stone points. I figure it's 0:08:18.280 --> 0:08:22.800 pretty accurate and no doubt an interesting thought. Like I 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:26.520 said before, Dr David Meltzer of s M, you literally 0:08:26.560 --> 0:08:29.520 wrote the book on fulsome and before we get much further, 0:08:29.680 --> 0:08:32.360 we need to understand what a fulsome point looks like 0:08:32.760 --> 0:08:35.480 and how it's made. And it would probably help if 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:39.240 you took a second and googled fulsome point and looked 0:08:39.240 --> 0:08:43.120 at an image of one. Here's Dr Meltzer describing what 0:08:43.160 --> 0:08:50.600 they look like. So fulsome points are some of the 0:08:51.320 --> 0:08:54.800 really wonderful examples of flint napping you will ever encounter. 0:08:55.160 --> 0:08:58.600 They tend to be about I'm gonna do this in 0:08:58.679 --> 0:09:05.360 centimeters because because I've been doing dr meltzer. Okay, so 0:09:05.400 --> 0:09:07.480 if you were a falsome point, you'd be in an 0:09:07.480 --> 0:09:11.080 inch and a half to two inches long. Okay, there 0:09:11.080 --> 0:09:13.480 we go. Um, we're gonna have to go millimeters though 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:16.640 here clay, because I can't tell you what two to 0:09:16.720 --> 0:09:20.160 three millimeters in thickness is understood, like an eighth of 0:09:20.200 --> 0:09:23.080 an inch thick, less than a quarter, much less than 0:09:23.080 --> 0:09:27.400 a quarter. We might be we might be talking sixte Uh, 0:09:27.559 --> 0:09:30.160 make them about an inch wide and uh, they have 0:09:30.280 --> 0:09:34.840 this very distinct flute. Think of it as a twentieth 0:09:34.880 --> 0:09:38.600 century bayonet, right a groove up the face. And in fact, 0:09:38.640 --> 0:09:41.319 when they were first discovered, it was thought because when 0:09:41.320 --> 0:09:43.240 they were first discovered it was you know, World War 0:09:43.280 --> 0:09:45.680 One was just a decade less than a decade old, 0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:48.360 it was thought that these were actually blood letting channels. 0:09:48.400 --> 0:09:51.640 But then they realized that for better penetration, well, for 0:09:51.679 --> 0:09:54.000 better penetration, and then you know, the animals bleeding and 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:56.719 it just goes down that channel and out right. Well, 0:09:56.760 --> 0:10:00.000 as it turns out, these points were hafted by which 0:10:00.080 --> 0:10:03.600 we mean they were attached to spears, and the base 0:10:03.640 --> 0:10:06.680 of the point would have been anchored in the tip 0:10:06.760 --> 0:10:10.439 of a spear, and it would be wrapped and held 0:10:10.480 --> 0:10:14.320 in place and the um. There might be some fore 0:10:14.400 --> 0:10:16.600 shafts or perhaps a notch at the top of the 0:10:16.679 --> 0:10:21.880 spear in which the point would be wrapped up. I've 0:10:21.880 --> 0:10:24.200 got one in my hands. This is uh, this is 0:10:24.240 --> 0:10:26.440 not authentic fulsome and in fact that's a replica of 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:28.720 falsome point. But the base of the point would have 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:33.440 been hafted or anchored into the tip of the spear. 0:10:33.520 --> 0:10:36.680 It might have been wrapped by sinews. They might have 0:10:36.800 --> 0:10:39.040 used some sort of mastick to kind of glue it 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:41.400 in there. But what that means is that the fluid 0:10:41.400 --> 0:10:44.400 itself would have been buried inside the haft area, so 0:10:44.440 --> 0:10:46.839 it couldn't have been a very good blood letting channel. Uh. 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:51.920 These points were beautifully symmetrical. They were often finely trimmed, 0:10:52.480 --> 0:10:55.040 with what we referred to as gentle sort of pressure 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:59.600 flaking up and down the edge, quite sharp, and would 0:10:59.640 --> 0:11:03.319 be you used for um hunting. These are not necessarily 0:11:03.360 --> 0:11:07.920 points that often had multi uses, so earlier Clovis points 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:10.640 we often see that they were used as knives as 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:14.000 well as projectiles. These things are built to hunt. These 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:17.640 are really this is a specialized point. Yeah, it's a 0:11:17.840 --> 0:11:20.840 it's a it's a point that is intended to bring 0:11:20.880 --> 0:11:23.280 down an animal. But a lot of the time because 0:11:23.280 --> 0:11:26.640 it's so thin, it's it's thinness makes it fragile. We 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:29.720 often see impact damage. You know, when stone meets bone 0:11:29.760 --> 0:11:35.559 and high velocity, it breaks. Dr Meltzer just brought up 0:11:35.640 --> 0:11:39.640 the weakness of the Fulsome technology. It's thin and it 0:11:39.760 --> 0:11:44.760 breaks easily. However, that's also its greatest strength. Thin points 0:11:44.840 --> 0:11:48.520 penetrate well, can be made very sharp and are easily 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:55.679 resharpened when the tips break. Devin Pettigrew isn't at the 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:59.800 Apologist and got his PhD at the University of Colorado, Boulder. 0:12:00.280 --> 0:12:04.200 His research is in experimental archaeology and he focuses on 0:12:04.240 --> 0:12:08.480 the tools and weapons of early hunter gatherers. He's an 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:11.600 expert on ad laddles, and we're gonna talk about those, 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:15.760 but first he's gonna describe Fulsome points. Several times in 0:12:15.800 --> 0:12:18.960 this podcast you'll hear us talk about Clovis points and 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:22.160 we'll describe them in contrast to the Fulsome point. So 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:23.960 it would be good if we understood what they were. 0:12:24.480 --> 0:12:27.439 It's handy to think about the different style of points 0:12:27.480 --> 0:12:32.080 as different kinds of broadhead technology, like cut on impact, 0:12:32.120 --> 0:12:37.640 fixed blade heads, or expandable broadheads. The Clovis technology is 0:12:37.760 --> 0:12:41.520 older than Fulsome technology, and it's easy to see that 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:45.680 Fulsome was the next step past Clovis. Clovis is a 0:12:45.840 --> 0:12:50.040 partially fluted point, and basically about one third of the 0:12:50.040 --> 0:12:53.320 base of the point had the slabs taken off the 0:12:53.440 --> 0:12:57.360 sides of it. The removal of the sides is called fluting. 0:12:58.040 --> 0:13:02.160 Fulsome points are fluted the entire way down the side 0:13:02.320 --> 0:13:06.959 to achieve maximum thinness on the point. You can imagine 0:13:07.040 --> 0:13:10.840 people going, well, if a little fluting is good, I 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:13.920 bet a lot of fluting would be even better. If 0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:17.440 that doesn't sound like human behavior, I don't know what does. 0:13:17.840 --> 0:13:24.000 Here's Devon describe for me a falsome point, like if 0:13:24.040 --> 0:13:25.600 no one had ever seen it and you just had 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:28.079 to use words, how would you describe? I would say, 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.400 we're dealing with a Lancelot style point, so you can 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:34.760 they give like a lance head. It's kind of long 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:37.160 and narrow, Yeah, long and narrows runs straight up the 0:13:37.160 --> 0:13:39.960 sides and it doesn't have a corner, it doesn't have 0:13:40.040 --> 0:13:43.040 notching in at the base. Um, it's got a slightly 0:13:43.080 --> 0:13:46.120 concave base. They're usually thin and they're made of high 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.360 quality material. They're very carefully flaked, and then they have 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:52.760 driven up the face on both sides from the base 0:13:53.160 --> 0:13:55.720 a big flute. And what this is it's a flake 0:13:55.800 --> 0:13:58.760 that runs almost the entire length of the point and 0:13:58.840 --> 0:14:01.560 just takes this handle. It takes the side of it. 0:14:01.600 --> 0:14:04.320 So if it's like a three inch imagine a three 0:14:04.360 --> 0:14:07.320 inch point and you just could just take a saw 0:14:07.400 --> 0:14:09.959 and just cut a slab at the side of it all. Yeah, 0:14:10.000 --> 0:14:11.960 if you if you could just I would say taking 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:14.360 if you could take your point and take a galuge 0:14:14.360 --> 0:14:17.520 and just gouge out a nice channel out of both sides, 0:14:17.559 --> 0:14:21.920 both sides. Yeah, but you have to do it with 0:14:19.200 --> 0:14:24.360 its one motion. Yes, So I mean they got to 0:14:24.360 --> 0:14:27.600 get right at one time pop hit it. Yeah. And 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:30.400 probably what they had since they were doing this, I 0:14:30.400 --> 0:14:33.080 mean this was a cultural you know, what we call 0:14:33.120 --> 0:14:36.040 an industry is stone tool industry. They had a specific 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:39.440 method of doing it that they that everybody knew and 0:14:39.480 --> 0:14:43.280 that worked for them and probably for close or clothes 0:14:43.360 --> 0:14:45.880 points and fulsome points that were fluted. That probably entailed 0:14:45.960 --> 0:14:48.040 some kind of a vice or a way to hold 0:14:48.080 --> 0:14:51.240 the point tightly and then make a very controlled strike, 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:55.360 probably with what we call indirect percussion, where actually taking 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:57.920 the tool that's going to do the work of not 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:00.280 driving off the flake, and you're taking another cool that 0:15:00.320 --> 0:15:02.640 you use as a hammer to it to strike that. Okay, 0:15:02.920 --> 0:15:05.400 so you can set like it'd be like you're trying 0:15:05.400 --> 0:15:07.080 to knock a flake off a rock. You put a 0:15:07.160 --> 0:15:09.000 chisel on top of the rock and then clack it 0:15:09.040 --> 0:15:12.000 with your hammer. You can get the indirect, indirect percussion 0:15:12.160 --> 0:15:16.280 and direct if your your chisel analog is right on, 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:18.240 because you could get the angle of it just right. 0:15:18.360 --> 0:15:20.440 You could put it right where you want it and 0:15:20.600 --> 0:15:23.320 hold it just straight at angle and then whack. That's 0:15:23.320 --> 0:15:25.800 probably how they're driving off those flakes, and you know, 0:15:26.000 --> 0:15:29.840 a very controlled fashion. That was you know, extremely they 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:37.440 had an art down these things. The craft involved in 0:15:37.520 --> 0:15:40.680 making these points is undeniable, and I want us to 0:15:40.680 --> 0:15:43.640 be immersed into the process of making a fulsome point. 0:15:44.320 --> 0:15:47.960 I want to hear it there's some real world drama 0:15:48.040 --> 0:15:51.360 because of the investment of time and using the valuable 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:55.080 material that much energy was expended to acquire and the 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:58.960 risky fluting process right at the end either makes or 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:02.840 breaks the point. No pun intended. It seems like the 0:16:02.920 --> 0:16:06.120 Burghers podcast. There's a lot of punts. But I want 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.280 you to meet my friend Rick Spicer. He's an experienced 0:16:09.320 --> 0:16:12.880 mountaineer and a bushcraft expert. He's one of the owners 0:16:12.880 --> 0:16:16.120 of a cool outdoor store in Fayetteville, Arkansas, called the 0:16:16.160 --> 0:16:20.080 pack Rat. Aside from climbing big mountains, Rick is a 0:16:20.080 --> 0:16:23.040 primitive bow hunter. He makes his own bows and naps 0:16:23.080 --> 0:16:26.600 his own stone points for hunting. I asked Rick if 0:16:26.640 --> 0:16:29.960 he'd be willing to try to make us a fulsome point, 0:16:30.240 --> 0:16:36.480 which he doesn't do very often, but he agreed to try. Okay, 0:16:36.520 --> 0:16:39.040 So what I've got here are a handful of different 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:42.800 preforms or by faces is another term that they're often 0:16:42.800 --> 0:16:46.320 referred to as. And a preform is simply kind of 0:16:46.360 --> 0:16:49.840 like a first stage of a stone point that uh, 0:16:49.920 --> 0:16:53.280 you know, an indigenous person. First people would have created 0:16:53.440 --> 0:16:55.120 that would have been lighter weight that they could have 0:16:55.160 --> 0:16:57.560 carried with them, and then from there they could have 0:16:57.600 --> 0:17:00.840 further refined that more into a specific tools. This would 0:17:00.840 --> 0:17:02.680 have been this, This is like a three point This 0:17:02.720 --> 0:17:04.800 would have been like a big rock, so they wouldn't 0:17:04.880 --> 0:17:07.479 want to carry, so they would have gone to you know, 0:17:07.840 --> 0:17:10.919 like in a um you know, alibates or or quarry 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:13.159 a stone corry. They would have corried this and obviously 0:17:13.240 --> 0:17:15.080 stones heavy, like they don't want to carry any more 0:17:15.080 --> 0:17:17.080 than they have to, so they would have corried this out. 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:19.199 They would have done what's called spawling. They would have 0:17:19.240 --> 0:17:22.760 cracked off pieces of that, and then from those spalls 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:25.840 they would have further refined those down into these bifaces 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:28.480 or preforms, and then they would have hauled those off 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:30.600 to their hunting sites and then a camp they would 0:17:30.600 --> 0:17:35.080 have further refined those into specific tools. Exactly, so you 0:17:35.160 --> 0:17:38.080 have so you've already built these preforms for us today 0:17:38.119 --> 0:17:42.760 because that would have taken Tell me how you're gonna 0:17:43.280 --> 0:17:46.560 turn that into a falsome. Yeah, so that's you know, 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:48.919 where the rubber meets the road, right, and so the 0:17:49.000 --> 0:17:53.360 thing right right right, So the thing that's so unique 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:57.440 about the falsome is the fluting process. And basically what 0:17:57.480 --> 0:18:00.560 you're doing in that process is you're striking it at 0:18:00.600 --> 0:18:03.760 the base of the preform to remove a very large 0:18:04.119 --> 0:18:07.160 flake off of it when you're thinning that point down 0:18:07.680 --> 0:18:10.600 to basically the maximum amount, so that when you fit 0:18:10.680 --> 0:18:14.040 it in the foreshaft, it's very very easy. You're basically 0:18:14.040 --> 0:18:16.560 just splitting a stick and sliding it into the end 0:18:16.560 --> 0:18:19.920 of it and by removing these flutes, and what's really 0:18:20.000 --> 0:18:22.639 unique is the way that there. It's symmetrical there, it's 0:18:22.680 --> 0:18:25.360 on both sides, and to do that on a folsome 0:18:25.400 --> 0:18:28.640 point and not break the thing is really really hard. 0:18:28.680 --> 0:18:32.960 So talk to me about how they think they did 0:18:33.000 --> 0:18:35.679 that with the jigs with Yeah, So there's kind of 0:18:35.880 --> 0:18:38.840 three ways you can go about getting a flake to 0:18:38.880 --> 0:18:41.040 release on one of these types of points. One way 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:44.119 is through direct percussion um and it's the most simple, 0:18:44.200 --> 0:18:47.440 but it's arguably the most difficult. And basically, you're gonna 0:18:47.480 --> 0:18:49.639 hold the thing in your hand and you're gonna strike 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:52.560 it with a hammerstone or an antler or something like that, 0:18:52.720 --> 0:18:54.680 and you're just gonna try to knock the flake off. 0:18:54.800 --> 0:18:57.000 But there's so many things that can go wrong trying 0:18:57.000 --> 0:18:58.920 to do that, to get the angle right, to hit 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:01.119 it in the right spot, all that type of stuff. 0:19:01.600 --> 0:19:04.119 You end up breaking a lot. The second way is 0:19:04.160 --> 0:19:06.520 going to be through indirect percussion, and that's where you 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:09.639 use what's called a punch. Typically you're gonna put that 0:19:09.720 --> 0:19:13.439 on the side or basically lead on the platform and 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:17.000 then hit that that tool with another tool with the hammer. 0:19:17.440 --> 0:19:20.119 That allows you a greater degree of control over the 0:19:20.200 --> 0:19:23.280 angle and the striking surface. But it it's still a 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:25.680 lot too Now you're working with like multiple things and 0:19:25.720 --> 0:19:27.600 trying to hold it all together, which is really hard 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:29.879 in the final way. And I think a lot of 0:19:30.640 --> 0:19:33.960 you know, anthropologists and certainly nappers would agree that it's 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:37.240 likely that they were using a jig of some kind. Now, 0:19:37.320 --> 0:19:40.119 modern nappers have man made jigs that they've used out 0:19:40.119 --> 0:19:42.639 a lumber and that sort of thing. But I have 0:19:42.760 --> 0:19:44.880 seen him. I've never done this myself, but I've seen 0:19:44.920 --> 0:19:47.800 demonstrations where basically you're driving a couple of sticks into 0:19:47.800 --> 0:19:51.560 the ground. You're putting the point upside down and bracing 0:19:51.560 --> 0:19:54.720 it up against these two sticks, which provide a stable 0:19:54.920 --> 0:19:58.400 surface to press against. And then they're using a lever 0:19:58.720 --> 0:20:03.439 to sort of gradually apply pressure and basically like pop 0:20:03.520 --> 0:20:06.199 that flute off of the back. Yeah, and it's a 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:09.240 it's a very like say, I don't have experience to 0:20:09.320 --> 0:20:11.920 doing it. I've not used jigs before. I've always used 0:20:11.920 --> 0:20:15.160 either direct percussion or indirect percussion. But I also break 0:20:15.160 --> 0:20:17.400 a lot of points, you know, in the process. So 0:20:18.119 --> 0:20:22.000 with this though, um, we're using heavy duty tools at 0:20:22.080 --> 0:20:26.240 a late stage point in the process where it's brittle, 0:20:26.320 --> 0:20:29.480 it's thin in the likelihood of doing something wrong and 0:20:29.520 --> 0:20:32.880 busting the thing is really really They say that they 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:39.640 estimate thirty failure even with the falseome people, Well, let's 0:20:39.640 --> 0:20:42.960 do it. Yeah, let's get get it going. So I'm 0:20:42.960 --> 0:20:47.000 gonna basically work away. Rick is working on building a 0:20:47.040 --> 0:20:49.239 platform at the base of the point that will give 0:20:49.320 --> 0:20:53.120 him a specific spot to strike that in theory, will 0:20:53.200 --> 0:20:56.320 cause the entire side of the point to flake off 0:20:56.680 --> 0:21:01.320 with one strike. The likelihood of failures seems really high 0:21:01.400 --> 0:21:04.000 to me. What are the chances this is gonna be 0:21:04.320 --> 0:21:07.080 is gonna work? I'd say there's a fifty percent chance 0:21:07.080 --> 0:21:10.800 I'll get a decent flute on it. There's probably a 0:21:11.000 --> 0:21:15.840 twenty chance that I'll break it, and a ten percent 0:21:15.960 --> 0:21:19.160 chance that we're gonna get a flute that's even remotely 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:23.919 close to a fulsome style flute. Yeah, yeah, So the 0:21:24.080 --> 0:21:26.920 platform is ready to go again. This is a direct 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:29.680 percussion method. So I'm gonna take uh, in this case, 0:21:29.720 --> 0:21:32.919 the copper billet, and I'm gonna strike it at a 0:21:33.000 --> 0:21:36.119 steep angle to try to get a flute to release 0:21:36.240 --> 0:21:42.280 down the center of this thing. I did there again, 0:21:43.040 --> 0:21:47.480 that's what happens. But the the yeah, I'll tell you what. 0:21:47.560 --> 0:21:50.399 I'm gonna clean it up just a little bit. And 0:21:50.440 --> 0:21:52.639 what basically what this means now is we're gonna end 0:21:52.680 --> 0:21:55.119 up with a shorter point because I knocked the rear 0:21:55.400 --> 0:21:59.600 one of the ears off. His first hit, broke the base. 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:08.680 He's gearing up for his second strike. Here we go. Okay, 0:22:09.280 --> 0:22:14.119 that's not yeah, you can see that if I flipped 0:22:14.160 --> 0:22:17.320 it over, there's the flute that's removed. So it was 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:22.040 in no way I thought that was gonna work. It's nice, 0:22:22.359 --> 0:22:27.359 it really really you you're holding this three inch long point, 0:22:28.240 --> 0:22:33.000 hitting it with a big clubby looking hammer basically right, 0:22:33.040 --> 0:22:36.359 and it takes off this like delicate flute off the side. 0:22:36.440 --> 0:22:42.399 That's when you see this process happen. It almost seems 0:22:42.480 --> 0:22:46.199 miraculous that this long flute just peels off with a 0:22:46.280 --> 0:22:49.840 single strike. But he's just halfway through. He's still got 0:22:49.840 --> 0:22:52.720 to do the other side. But I'll save you the 0:22:52.800 --> 0:22:56.600 stress of drama. Rick was successful at getting a partial 0:22:56.640 --> 0:22:59.120 flute on the other side, but it wouldn't have been 0:22:59.119 --> 0:23:02.520 considered a true fulsome style point. Rick said, it would 0:23:02.560 --> 0:23:06.119 be closer to the partial fluting of the Clovis style point. 0:23:06.440 --> 0:23:08.760 And if you're interested in watching Rick make a point, 0:23:08.920 --> 0:23:11.560 I'll put a short clip on my Instagram and you 0:23:11.600 --> 0:23:19.720 can also follow Rick at pack rat Bushcraft on Instagram. 0:23:19.760 --> 0:23:23.520 The biggest question that remains unanswered is why did they 0:23:23.600 --> 0:23:26.960 take the risk of such extreme fluting. The point would 0:23:26.960 --> 0:23:29.760 have killed animals without the fluting, but they employed this 0:23:29.840 --> 0:23:35.440 technology across vast geographic regions for one thousand years. Think 0:23:35.480 --> 0:23:39.440 about this, what other technologies in human history have been 0:23:39.560 --> 0:23:44.159