Awl or scraper?

[Kierran]

I hunted a new (to me) site yesterday morning and found the usual white quartz chips, which is always a good sign. However, I was very happy to stumble upon this broken tool, especially since it's an exotic material for my area. Nice mustard yellow colored flint or chert.

I originally thought it could be a small scraper that would have been hafted. Then a friend suggested it could be a broken awl. Any thoughts? Thanks in advance.

[Hoss]

Kierran, That looks like Yellow Jasper to me. It can be found in CT. I have a chunk out of a creek I used to Trout fish many moons ago. It looks like multi purpose the steep bevel is a scraper but it may have been a graver too bottom of pic. Is the underside just flat?

[Kierran]

Originally Posted by Hoss

Kierran, That looks like Yellow Jasper to me. It can be found in CT. I have a chunk out of a creek I used to Trout fish many moons ago. It looks like multi purpose the steep bevel is a scraper but it may have been a graver too bottom of pic. Is the underside just flat?

Thanks for the reply, Matt. The underside is flat as paper. I will have to look up a graver.

I have one other piece of this kind of material; a base of a broken point I believe. Pretty neat to find around us.

[Mud Hawk]

More edge pics would help, but I would guess the "awl" end on that piece was socketed into a handle. There was a good post a while back that showed an example that was still intact with the handle. I beleive the consensus was that using scrapers "as is" would tear up your hand quickly.

Might not apply to all scrapers though...

Nice find BTW!

Edit: And I Always Thought They Were Thumb Scrapers Found it!

Also, might want to have posted this in recent finds...

[Kierran]

Thanks for the reply and link, Mud Hawk. I can try to take better pics soon (that was on a cell phone).

Also, after posting, I realized it was the wrong spot for this thread, doh!

[eddies]

that is very nice looking material whatever it is

[Hoss]

Thanks Mud Hawk, I agree it is beautiful material and a cool find! PS don't know why I said graver it must be stuck in my mind. Meant Burin check out this link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Bu...3_5_Global.jpg