Breathitt chert

[CDEAN]

I got a question for anyone who's knowledgeable on material from the KY area.

I've often seen points made of something called Breathitt chert, but I've never been able to find out where it outcrops. Does/did it outcrop in Breathitt County KY? And I also read somewhere that the source of it is destroyed?

[joshuaream]

It is named for the Breathitt Formation limestone, not the county. Several road cuts in Estill and Powell counties have St. Louis Green in one layer, and a grainy Breathitt chert in another layer. I am not sure where the original quarries were, but there are places in the red river gorge where it is naturally exposed.

[CDEAN]

Oh neat. I try to go to the Red River Gorge every weekend, so I'll have to be on the lookout for that.

[ghost recon]

What are the distinguishing characteristics of Breathitt chert? Seems like no two pieces look alike imo.

[Govsha31]

All the artifacts I have seen that are made out of Breathitt are rough celts and tools. It makes sense cause it is some grainy material.

[joshuaream]

Originally Posted by ghost recon

What are the distinguishing characteristics of Breathitt chert? Seems like no two pieces look alike imo.

A fine question. And one that I put a lot of effort into learning while I lived in Kentucky. We lived in a dry county and I'm happily married, there wasn't much else to do...

In some areas, the same basic limestone structures extend from Indiana, Illinois and Kentucky all the way down into Alabama. And in these layers of limestone, there are lenses or beds of chert and cherty-limestone. There are minor color changes as well as changes in quality (fine grains, grainy, glossy, etc.) in the different layers, but the only way to absolutely identify these cherts is by the layer it comes from.

Often times the famous quarry is named after a place where the material was close to the surface for some geological reason, but the reality is that they are all found across a huge area. Carter Cave (Paoli) has a couple of famous quarries, but you can also find it in some of the older rock outcroppings in other areas of the state.

If you go to commercial quarry (eg the massive Reed Quarry in Ky) you can get samples of many different types of chert, St. Louis, Breathitt, Ft. Payne, and even Paoli (Carter Cave) towards the bottom. Mill Creek Chert is found in thin lenses and nodules in Kentucky, just above the thick layers of Ft. Payne. It is geologically the same as the Mill Creek Chert used in Illinois, but doesn't appear to have been exposed anywhere in central Kentucky. The Paoli stuff is pretty easy to identify, but the rest can be difficult to identify. Toss in that many of these cherts exhibit significant color change from age, and texture changes from heating, and I'd say it's basically a guess based on a set of defined traits.

Breathitt is grainier than the others. Fort Payne is mottled. St. Louis green has banding and different color changes. That said, all of them can have any of these characteristics.

[ghost recon]

Joshua, great info man, thanks for the reply on Breathitt and other chert types and formations in Ky. and elsewhere. Good stuff.

[flintseeker]

Great question! I just came upon this post and read it - very educational!

Is it safe to say the attached points are made of Breathitt chert? Both were found in Boone County, KY...

[ghost recon]

I think it's possibly Breathitt flintseeker, although I'm not 100% sure.

For reference here are three pieces of Breathitt from Kentucky. The differences in appearance is why I asked that question earlier.

[flintseeker]

Wow, well that's a completely different look than mine - strange...

Thanks!

Shane