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Projectile Points

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 January 2017

Jim Browne
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Extract

Due, I believe, to the lack of a working knowledge of the bow and the atlatl, the tendency with some archaeologists is to date sites by the size of projectile points. In this paper, the writer hopes to prove this method is wrong.

The pre-historic peoples, and especially the nomadic peoples, lived by hunting. The atlatl and spear, or the bow and arrow, were in daily use during a period covering many thousands of years. These peoples were thinkers, inventors and experimenters, and it is reasonable to expect that they all made and used very efficient projectile points. The sole purpose of a projectile point is to pierce the hide of an animal and to enter the body cavity deep enough to cause a hemorrhage that will in time kill the animal. Two agencies will cause the penetration—speed and weight.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 5 , Issue 3 , January 1940 , pp. 209 - 213
Copyright
Copyright © The Society for American Archaeology 1940

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References

324 Campbell, E. W. C., American Antiquity, Volume I, No. 4.Google Scholar

325 Steward, Julian H., Bureau of American Ethnology, Bulletin 116.

326 Baker, W. E., and Kidder, A. V., American Antiquity, Volume III, No. 1.Google Scholar