The Seed for the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy

Figure One - Four-inch long discoidal biface made from Alibates 

agatized dolomite surrounded by Folsom artifacts. 

John Bradford Branney Collection. 

        The seed for the prehistoric adventure book series the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy sprouted on a warm summer morning in 2010 on a beautiful ranch on the high plains of northern Colorado. Since I was a child, my passion is searching for the artifacts of our prehistoric past. For over three decades, I hunted prehistoric artifacts on that Colorado ranch two or three times per year. The ranch sits in a large bowl-shaped valley surrounded by rolling prairie and sandstone bluffs. During prehistoric times, a natural spring supplied water to a stream that meandered down the length of the valley. The stream attracted large mammals which in turn attracted prehistoric humans.

        Over the years, I have found several hundred prehistoric artifacts in this valley, many of them stone projectile points known as arrows, darts, knife forms, and/or spear points. From an archaeological perspective, we use stone projectile points as indicators of the prehistoric culture that left them behind. By tying a style and technology of a projectile point to a dated archaeological site, archaeologists established an age range for certain stone projectile point types. Even when I find one of these projectile point types on the surface of the ground, out of archaeological and geological context, I am sure of the prehistoric culture it came from. Throughout North America's prehistory, humans have changed the style and technology of the stone projectile points they used allowing us to earmark the style and technology to specific prehistoric cultures.

Figure Two - 1.2 inch long Folsom dart point out of an

off-white chalcedony surface found on private land in

Adams County, Colorado.

John Bradford Branney Collection.

        Let's say I find a thin, fluted projectile point with micro retouch edgework on the high plains like the one in figure two. I can be pretty sure it is a Folsom point and that the age is somewhere north of 12,000 years old.

Figure Three - BEYOND the CAMPFIRE, the latest book
in the SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy. 

        Back to the northern Colorado ranch...From the different types of projectile points I have found at the northern Colorado ranch on what I now call the SHADOWS on the TRAIL archaeological site, I have come up with clear prehistory for that northern Colorado valley. Nomadic hunters and gatherers called Clovis came to the valley after the end of the last ice age, sometime around 13,150 years ago. After Clovis came other peoples and cultures who made different projectile point styles, right up through the historical Indian tribes in the 1800s. 

Figure Three - Four-inch long discoidal biface made 

from Alibates agatized dolomite, a rock type originating 

at a prehistoric rock quarry in Texas.

John Bradford Branney Collection. 

        Back to that warm summer morning in 2010. I was strolling along in the sand of a dry streambed. My eagle eyes were watching the ground, searching as they always do for that sun-reflected glint of the kind of rock used by prehistoric humans. Out of my peripheral vision, I spotted a large piece of chert (a rock type used to make prehistoric tools) lying on a small pedestal of sand. I knew immediately it was a prehistoric artifact. Before picking the artifact up, I studied it from every angle. I pulled out my camera and took several photographs of the artifact the way I found it (unfortunately, every photograph turned out blurry). I finally picked the artifact up and brushed away centuries of accumulated dirt and sand. One side of the prehistoric artifact was encrusted with pedogenic carbonate deposits, an indicator of its antiquity. I smiled while studying the prehistoric artifact knowing that I was probably the first human to touch it in over 12,000 years. Think about that; over TWELVE thousand years! That, my friends, is a very long time.

Archaeologists call the type of prehistoric artifact I found a discoidal biface or core, a technical name for a large and flat disc-shaped tool made by prehistoric humans for a specific purpose. The Paleoindian who made this discoidal biface hammered out a fairly sharp edge around the circumference of the rock. The prehistoric human probably used this artifact as an all-purpose tool for scraping hides, chopping wood, and cutting through animal bones and tendons.

Figure Four - Paleoindian. Photo courtesy 
of Manhattan Museum.  

Besides being an all-purpose tool, the discoidal biface served another purpose. Since these nomadic prehistoric hunters were not always near a quarry or source of rock for tools, they used this large discoidal biface as a portable rock supply. When the Paleoindians needed a new stone tool or projectile point, they simply hammered off a small piece of rock from the discoidal biface and made a new tool, right there on the spot.

      The discoidal biface I found that day in northern Colorado was special for another reason. The prehistoric human who made it used Alibates agatized dolomite, a rock type only found on the Panhandle of Texas. That led me to believe that the Paleoindians who made this discoidal biface brought it five hundred miles north to Colorado where they ultimately lost or abandoned it. Finding Alibates agatized dolomite in northern Colorado is not a common occurrence. Out of a thousand pieces of chipping debris that I pick up on an annual basis, I might find one or two chips made from Alibates. That was the very first discoidal biface I ever found made from Alibates agatized dolomite. 

          My initial question when I found the discoidal biface was why a Paleoindian would carry that bulky piece of Alibates agatized dolomite all the way from Texas when there were numerous tool stone sources within a stone’s throw (literally) away of where I found that artifact? 

       I believe one reason was that Paleoindians and other prehistoric humans were enamored with the beauty of Alibates agatized dolomite. Alibates agatized dolomite is a very distinctive rock with colors ranging from maroon to red and gray to black. Mix in some white and tan with banded shades of pink, blue, purple, and brown, and Alibates agatized dolomite shows off a rainbow of colors. Prehistoric humans were fascinated with its brilliant and exotic colors and must have believed that the rock held some mystical power over the mammals they hunted. 

     

Figure Five - Folsom dart point made from Flattop Chalcedony and found near the discoidal biface.
John Bradford Branney Collection.   

         When I found this ancient discoidal biface made from Texas rock, my mind wanted to know who made this artifact, what were they like, and what happened to them? The SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy is my five-book story about three generations of Paleoindians who started a journey from Texas to ultimately northern Wyoming. During the journey, one of the Paleoindians dropped that discoidal biface on the ground and twelve thousand plus years later I found it. The main characters of the adventure belong to a real culture of prehistoric humans called the Folsom People, a mystical group of hunters and gatherers who roamed western North America for about five to seven hundred years from around 12,800 years ago to 12,200 years ago. The Folsom people left behind a distinctive calling card for us to discover; beautifully crafted stone projectile points that distinguished themselves with a wide flute or channel running most of the length of the projectile point from tip to base. Today, finding a Folsom projectile point on the prairie or plains is the equivalent of finding the Holy Grail. Folsom projectile points are as rare as hens' teeth and they are arguably the finest made projectile points in North America’s prehistoric past. 

Join the adventure by reading the 

SHADOWS on the TRAIL Pentalogy

you will be glad you did!  

Figure Six - The discoidal biface is surrounded by four Folsom dart points and one 

Alibates end scraper at seven o'clock. Age for artifacts twelve thousand years plus. 

John Bradford Branney Collection.  

The historical fiction novels written by John Bradford Branney are known for their impeccable research and biting realism. In his latest blockbuster novel BEYOND the CAMPFIRE  Branney launches his readers smack dab into the middle of the late Pleistocene along the high plains of North America. BEYOND the CAMPFIRE is Branney's eleventh book.  

John Bradford Branney holds a geology degree from the University of Wyoming and an MBA from the University of Colorado.