Description

“This is a monumental piece of work. One of the biggest challenges archaeologists have is the consistent identification of projectile point types. [T]he need for consistency in point type identification is a critical starting point for any higher level analysis . … [This work] provides a clear set of implications in the case of diffusion/migration and how they relate to projectile point design.”
-Bradley Vierra, Statistical Research, Inc.

This book presents a comprehensive typology of the projectile points that were made by the earliest farmers in the Greater Southwest during the last two millennia B.C. Textual descriptions are accompanied by photographs and diagrams showing how key attributes are discerned and combined into diagnostic sets that are used for type identifications. Case studies drawn from cultural resources management projects stretching from northern Sonora to the Four Corners are presented to demonstrate how projectile point typological data may be combined with anthropological and sociological theory to investigate issues of migration, social identity, and social relations in the archaeological record.

R. Jane Sliva has worked with lithic assemblages from a variety of regions and time periods in Europe, the Middle East, and South America. Since 1994, she has focused on the flaked stone technology of the U.S. Southwest and Northwest Mexico. In addition to refining projectile point typologies, she has developed techniques for using the patterns apparent within debitage assemblages to address questions of temporal affiliation and spatial organization within archaeological sites in Arizona.