Flintstones! Or just flint. Take your pick.

When you think of Fort Ancient Indians, get this above image out of your head.  First of all, people did not live with dinosaurs, especially Hopewell Indians like those of the Fort Ancient Culture (remember time periods, people: 1100 - 1650).  However, Dino their pet dinosaur does indeed suggest the domestication of animals, and in this case, dinosaurs.  Second of all, there is no indication of agriculture or traditional instances of ancient development of culture.  A more accurate depiction of our "Fort Ancient Flintstone Family" is this:

Here, we see the collective group effort of gathering corn and distributing roles apart from traditional gender roles seen in The Flinstones. The only thing that we can take from The Flintstones that can be of some value is their use of stone, especially flint.  Fort Ancient Indians are known predominantly for at least 3 or 4 different styles of knapping flint.  The first example is their triangular point that does not have a notch or stem that is usually seen in projectile points like arrowheads.

Here is a collection of projectile points that were indicative of the late Fort Ancient period (Madisonville).  Some of the points were broken off, leaving behind only the base of the point or its tip.  As you can see, all of the points are missing the base where a notch would be except for the earlier point in the lower right-hand corner.  That point is archaic, showing again that Fort Ancient Indians reused points they found from earlier time periods.  Another type of point is a serrated point that is also triangular and missing the base.  In fact, it is entirely similar to the other points but just has serrations.

I think these are my favorite points simply because it shows the extra work that has to go into making points because the natives have to be careful in the way they strike the flint otherwise it will not make notches and instead shatter.  Finally, as you could see in the previous picture, the early Fort Ancient points were early woodland period and were similar to Mississippian cultures.  When I was excavating in the latrine this summer, I found a Mississippian point that was re-utilized as an early Archaic point, again indicating this notion of recycling in ancient cultures.  

The special features of the points at the site I work at have that special "hump" in the middle of the point.  The meaning behind this hump has yet to be explained, but these humps make these points distinctive at the Hahn site for Fort Ancient Indians.  In the first picture, the points to the left have this hump, or at least a small trace of it. 

Other examples of flint knapping include scrapers for tanning hides of leather and knife blades.  

All of these are my favorite things to find because, though pottery is exciting and pretty and a challenge to make, I find flint to be a beautiful manipulation of the world.  The native has to pick the proper flint (flintstone is not a proper term for it), hit it in a special way, and out of these multiple attempts at striking at this rock, a beautiful tool is created.  It's incredible to see how we use tools today and how tools were created and utilized centuries ago.  Seeing the beautiful manipulation of rocks and uncovering it from the ground, though the sharp little pieces of chert may cut up my hands, I fall even more in love with digging in the dirt and finding more connections to the world in the past.  

If you wanna learn how to flint knap, here's a decent youtube video!

FLINT KNAPPING!