pip. No^"2lY' J0I3^ H. KERR RESERVOIR BASIN — MILLER 95 



Flaking may be classed as horizontal, transverse or diagonal, to 

 irregular, while flake size may show a high degree of variability. 

 Secondary chipping, or retouching, may or may not be present. 



Recently, attention was called to a number of illustrations used by 

 de Mortillet (1881) , indicating the various steps in the construction of 

 fluted points in Europe formed by transverse or collateral chipping 

 followed by the casting off of the central longitudinal flake or flakes 

 on either side of the artifact to create the characteristic fluting effect. 

 Single, double, or multiple-channel flakes were cast off, giving the 

 object a fluted effect similar to those displayed by the New World 

 forms. 



The presence of fluting in Europe would explode the present con- 

 ception that this technique was a New World invention. There are 

 many references in the literature which state that fluting did not 

 occur in the Old World and that the New World man invented the 

 casting off of long, centrally placed channel flakes, creating a fluting 

 effect on his projectile points. Since this technique does not occur in 

 Siberia or any of the immediate territory and it does occur in Euro- 

 pean Swiss lake-dwellers' deposits, one would have to stop to explain 

 the reason for this invention and how it got to the New World either 

 by diffusion or by actual contact. Was this an independent New 

 World invention or did it have its inception elsewhere ? Wliich direc- 

 tion did it move and who invented this process? These are factors 

 that must be answered to justify the statement that Early Man only 

 succeeded in crossing the Bering Straits into the New World and that 

 some of the earliest points utilized by him were of the fluted variety. 

 There must have been some contact between the early men of Europe 

 and those in the New World and if it can be proved conclusively that 

 there was no contact then there is reason to suggest independent inven- 

 tion of this process. A provocative thought is that the manufactur- 

 ing techniques of Folsom points, and others, have been compared to 

 the nicely chipped Solutrean points of Europe. All of these were 

 made by master stone chippers. Here is found another point in com- 

 mon that links Early Man of the New World, not with Asia, but with 

 Europe. 



Flaking tools have never been satisfactorily determined. It is 

 known that both bone and horn (antler) fragments have been util- 

 ized in the manufacture of the various chipped objects, but it is not 

 usually known that chipped-stone tools were also used for this purpose 

 as well. Late in the 19th centuiy Sir John Evans (1897, pp. 412- 

 416) described a number of "finger-slim" chipped-stone objects as 

 "flaking tools or fabricators," which he believed to have been used in 

 the chipping of other stone tools. In France, these objects have been 

 called "ecrasoirs" by M. de Mortillet (1881, pi. 45, Nos. 411-418), 



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