Erosion-resistant novaculite outcrops on top of some Ouachita Mountain ridges.
Vanessa Hanvey records novaculite debris next to trench feature.
A chalky white cortex is sometimes found on flakes at quarries.
Black novaculite may not be translucent at all.
Where is Novaculite Found?
Novaculite outcrops in the Central Ouachita Mountains in western Arkansas and eastern Oklahoma, along what geologists refer to as the Benton-Broken Bow Uplift. The Arkansas Novaculite Formation is made up of beds of massive novaculite, with interbedded chert and shale. Layers of novaculite rock, tilted during mountain formation, are exposed on ridge-tops in the Ouachita Mountains.
We have over 120 novaculite quarries recorded as archeological sites in Arkansas, most in Garland, Hot Spring, Montgomery, and Polk counties. Many are located on U.S.D.A. Forest Service lands in the Ouachita National Forest. Quarry pits and trenches, hammerstones for breaking up the rock, and novaculite debris from initial chipping, show us tangible evidence of aboriginal quarrying at these sites. Help us to preserve these significant archeological sites by leaving artifacts where they lie. Collecting and digging damages these important historic places.
Novaculite Sources and Distribution
This website is envisioned as a resource both for archeologists and researchers, and for people interested in learning about history and archeology. Archeologists and cultural resource professionals who work in and around Arkansas and Oklahoma can use this website as a virtual comparative collection to aid in the identification of artifact raw materials. Here you will find descriptions and photographs of samples of novaculite from quarries across the Ouachita Mountains, as well as available information on visual and chemical characteristics of the raw material. We show the variability in novaculite, both within and between quarries.
You can help too!
We are looking for your help! We are interested in getting feedback from archeologists and other researchers who have identified novaculite artifacts in site assemblages beyond the novaculite source region. If you have information on novaculite use in your area, email us at arkarch@uark.edu. We'd like to add your county to our map and learn more about novaculite distribution and exchange mechanisms in the past.
Tyler Stumpf measuring translucency of novaculite sample in lab.
Novaculite Description
We have developed a coding system to describe samples of novaculite curated at the Arkansas Archeological Survey's Henderson State University Research Station and observed at quarries. The main attributes we describe are color, cortex, texture, luster, and translucency.
Color and variations in color are described using color chips in a Munsell Rock Color Book. Cortex, where present, is described as either a stained weathering rind, or a rough, chalky white exterior. Texture is recorded as fine, medium or coarse; following John Rick, we judge the amount of drag or scratch when rubbing thumb and fingernail across the surface of the sample. Luster is related to texture but specifically refers to the light reflected from the surface of a sample, as described by Barbara Luedtke. To put it simply, does the sample reflect light or not? We differentiate between matte or dull and shiny or lustrous in our samples. Translucency is the ability to see light through a piece of the rock, and is a distinctive characteristic of novaculite. We have adapted Stanley Ahler's method of holding a sample at a standard (8 cm) distance from a lightbulb (we use a 20 watt compact fluorescent bulb) and measuring the thickness (in mm) at which the translucency decreases and the sample becomes opaque.Read more about Arkansas Novaculite and chert description in these references:
You are seeing a preliminary version of this website. Thanks to a planning mini-grant from the Arkansas Humanities Council, we have created a 3-page prototype of the novaculite virtual comparative collection website. If you like what you see and think it would be useful to develop the full version, let us know!
For comments or further information on this website, please contact Mary Beth Trubitt, Arkansas Archeological Survey, mtrubit@uark.edu.
Website text and photographs created by Mary Beth Trubitt, Tyler Stumpf, and Vanessa Hanvey (Arkansas Archeological Survey, Arkadelphia). Website design and coding created by John Samuelsen (Arkansas Archeological Survey, Fayetteville). We thank Christopher Davies and Lydell Lively for their comments on this project.
This project is supported in part by a grant from the Arkansas Humanities Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Copyright 2012, 2013, Arkansas Archeological Survey
2475 North Hatch Avenue
Fayetteville, AR 72704
479-575-3556
arkarch@uark.edu
