May 8, 2008...4:20 pm
palaioslithos
I just found out that I would make a horrible prehistoric Neanderthal. We were learning how to make flakes (basically shards off of stones; arrowheads and Clovis points and stuff), in which I severely injured myself (’severely’ is being used very loosely here). So to make a flake, you’re suppose to use a stone or antler to hit the platform of another larger rock at a little less than 90° angle, and shear off a flake (and then make that into an arrowhead of dart point or whatever).
Not only did I learn I sucked at making flakes, but I also learned that I had extremely bad aim with rocks. Naturally, I received a bunch of cuts and bruises on my fingers/hands/leg/arms. I mean seriously how do you even have enough strength to break a rock with another rock?
After making a passable flake, we were suppose to pound that bad boy into certain types of points (mine was just the basic stem with a long point). We were using obsidian because that’s one of the easiest rocks to work with (the easiest to be broken… but still not that easy), because its got almost the same texture as glass. Oh, and isn’t glass super sharp? Yeah… now I have battle scars from making a 1 inch long tool, great. I guess I’m a klutz when it comes to making points for hunting (who knew, honestly?), but it doesn’t matter because women in those ages probably just picked veggies and weaved baskets. Whew.
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