Point Type: MAPLES
Also See: Abbey, Bascom, Coosa, Elora, Ledbetter, Morrow Mountain, Pickwick, Savannah River

Location: Southeastern United States

Associated Dates: 4500 - 3500 B.P. - Middle Archaic
Morphology: Stemmed

General Description: The Maples is a very large, broad, thick, short stemmed knife blade with shoulders that are tapered and a stem that is contracting to rounded with a concave to straight base. The basal edge is excurvate or straight, usually thinned and may be ground. The Maples is usually very thick and crudely made however examples showing high quality knapping have been found. The cross-section ranges from flat to twisted to biconvex. The blade edges of the Maples are excurvate but can be straight. The distal end is usually acute.

The Maples almost always has random knapping scars and thus this type should not be confused with the Morrow Mountain type which is similar in outline but has Archaic parallel flaking scars. Broad, shallow to deep flaking was used to shape the blade and stem. A minimum of secondary flaking was used and on some examples, only one edge of a blade face was secondarily flaked. Local materials were used, especially Ft. Payne chert.

Perino hypothesizes that the Maples could be a preform for the either the Abbey point or an otherwise unnamed point type. The point is often found in shell mounds along the Tennessee River in Alabama, Tennessee and also in northern Mississippi.

The size of the Maples ranges from 61 mm to 120 mm in length, shoulder width ranges from 37 mm to 72 mm, stem width ranges from 24 mm to 50 mm, stem length ranges from 8 mm to 16 mm, thickness ranges from 10 mm to 18 mm.

The Maples was named by James W. Cambron in 1962 for examples which he found in sites along the Elk River near Maples Bridge, Limestone County, Alabama.

About the Point Above (Left): The large Maples blade pictured at the top left hand side of this page was found in Hardin County, Tennessee. The point is made from a dull brown chert material. Overall, the point measures 91 mm in length, is 41 mm wide at the shoulders, and is 14 mm thick in mid blade. The stem is 11 mm long and is 22 mm wide and contracts down to 14 mm wide. The stem is thinned to 7 mm in thickness. The flaking scars are random, however quite a bit of fine retouch has been applied to both faces of each blade edge. The random flaking on the non-pictured face is crude. The basal edge and stem edges have been lightly ground. Catalog Number 135-23-D

About the Point Above (Right): The Maples blade pictured at the top right hand side of this page was found in Marked Tree, Arkansas. The point is made from a dull white gray chert material with rust colored inclusions. Overall, the point measures 73 mm in length, is 46 mm wide at the shoulders, and is 8.6 mm thick in mid blade. The stem is 16 mm long and is 30 mm wide and contracts down to 19 mm in width. The stem is thinned to 3.5 mm in thickness. The flaking scars are random, however quite a bit of fine retouch has been applied to both faces of each blade edge. The random flaking on the non-pictured face is crude. The basal edge and stem edges have been lightly ground. Catalog Number 144-78-Z

References: Baker, Cambron & Hulse, Justice(1), Overstreet, Perino (1), Puckett (1)

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