Kennewick Man and Arrowheads and Hikes, oh my...

So yesterday was an interesting day in the Bryan household. I got to go on a hike up to Angels Rest with my friend Renee. While I was gone, William and the boys apparently ran into a Native American man along their bike ride who convinced them that he had a special power for finding arrowheads. So of course, when I got home, they had to show me the arrowhead that the guy found supposedly at Hamilton Creek and gave to them. Of course I have to be the skeptic in the household and just by looking at it, I concluded that it was not an actual arrowhead. To me it looks more like a geofact (a naturally formed item that looks like an artifact but is not. It was created by nature not man). They insisted that the guy was right so I pulled out my magnify glass and insisted that he was wrong. (Yes...I am the type of nerd who keeps a magnify glass on hand and ready at all times.) Here are pictures of the rock for your viewing pleasure:

There are no tool marks, striations, flaking of any kind on the rock. One side is completely flat, the other is what you see up above. Just to be certain I promised I would take it to the Fort and see if I could use their high tech magnify glass to look at it more in depth.

Here is my reasoning for saying its not an arrowhead: First off, arrowheads are usually categorized by type. There are certain styles that are indicative of particular regions and groups. Take a look at the chart below.

Click picture for a fun e-how article on identifying arrowheads.

The "arrowhead" in question does not fall into any of these categories. Leave it to my husband to suggest that perhaps the person who made it was a rebel and decided he wanted to make his arrowhead the way he wanted and not how others wanted him to make it. (Que Rachel grumpy face).

Secondly, I pointed out to them that the "arrowhead" or rock, as I had now taken to calling it, did not have any markings on it to suggest that it had been flaked by a human hand. The making of a real arrowhead leaves distinct markings on the projectile. None of those markings were present. Not to mention that the general shape of the rock was not anything close to an arrowhead style that I had seen.

The discussion ended with me basically chastising everyone within hearing distance that if it had in fact been an arrowhead then they would have been committing an ethical crime by removing it from its location. Yes, arrowheads are super super awesome and I would love to have a giant collection of them but that's just not possible because to remove one from the location in which it was found would be destroying its provenance which is an archeological CRIME!!! You heard me! It's wrong! Don't do it! Ever...no matter how cool it is. Take note of where it lies and contact the state archeological office.(Check out this link for more arrowhead information.)

Of course, within a couple hours of this discussion we were back on the topic of Anthropology which is weird cause its actually not something we tend to talk about all that much at my house. Mainly because my husband is a creationist (bless his heart) and I am a evolutionist and its just not a good conversation for us to be having. How we got started on the topic of Kennewick Man, I am still unsure of. I think he made some smart remark about Native Americans not really being Native Americans and that lead into the abyss that is Anthropology discussions in our home.

For those of you who don't know about the Kennewick Man, stick around cause this one is awesome.

 On July 28th 1996, 2 men accidentally stumbled across skeletal remains along the Columbia River in Kennewick Washington. Upon finding the remains, the men contacted the local police department fearing they had stumbled across the remains of some poor murder victim. The police contacted a specialist who came out and looked at the bones and right away they realized this was no ordinary skeleton.

Upon further testing it was discovered that the Kennewick Man was around 9000 years old. Not only that but he had Caucasoid features (the pc term for white/European features). This lead to a huge controversy because the Umatilla Tribe was attempting to claim him for proper burial shortly after the find was made. Their claim was that he was found within their territory and that their oral history had gone back 10,000 years making him a part of their tribe. However, the government ruled against them and the remains are still in the hands of scientists.

So, it begs the questions, if the Kennewick Man is not Native American what is he? Some say that he has more in common with Polynesians than Native Americans. I had a professor who believed that he was most likely closely related to the Ainu of Japan. Where ever he came from is a mystery and will likely remain so. But it is an important thing to note because it gives weight to the theory that there were multiple migrations to North America over the course of a long period of time before the Bering Land Bridge went away. We know that evidence of humans have been found in South America as late as 12000 years ago and in North America around 10000 years ago. Many people note that the Columbia River Gorge has been occupied by Native Americans for the last 10000 years which would be in line with the Umatilla version of events. Whatever the truth behind the Kennewick Man may be, it is still one of the most interesting and controversial finds to come out of Washington State to this day. Maybe one day we will have the opportunity to find more like him.

Finally, a brief mention (just cause this could be my longest post ever), I took video of the top of Angels Rest looking out over the Columbia River that I will be uploading soon to this site. I want to be able to give everyone who reads my blog that has never stepped foot in Washington a visual on what it is I spend a great deal of time talking about.

Until next time...

Rachel B.