Abstract
North American brass projectile points conjure a variety of archaeological narratives. Depending on the interpreter and the context of interpretation, they serve as evidence for: simplistic replacement of local traditions by technologically superior European-introduced materials; the homogenizing forces of global capitalism; nuanced and complicated Indigenous-colonial histories; and/or Indigenous survivance and adaptability. Irrespective of the narratives that they inspire, however, brass projectiles remain under-studied and under-theorized in North American archaeology. This paper addresses this dearth by analyzing and rethinking a large museum assemblage of brass projectile points from Ontario. The analysis offers insights into the variability and history of brass projectiles, specifically as they relate to lithic traditions. The brass assemblage under consideration points to the significance of New Materialist perspectives on relationality, on post-anthropocentrism, and on change and history. Whereas archaeological habits tend to characterize North American brass projectiles as permutations of “old” plus “new” with minimal engagement with the objects themselves, this paper thinks with brass points, seeking out new angles of understanding that recognize their novelty.
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Notes
Throughout the paper, I use the term “brass” to refer to the copper alloy metals used to make kettles, projectile points, and more. Portable x-ray fluorescence analysis of some of the brass projectile points in the study collection is currently underway and will undoubtedly shed new light on their precise elemental composition.
In comparison with the literature, point NS40893 is a temporal outlier since most archaeologists in the Great Lakes and the broader Northeast associate brass points with seventeenth- and eighteenth-century practices. Discussion of nineteenth-century brass points is rare.
These new directions in theory partially parallel recent archaeological studies of technology that document subtle and nuanced patterns of technological change and technological replacement (e.g., Manclossi et al, 2019).
As described in early ethnohistoric sources, Iroquoian slat armor was made from wood and other woven organic materials (see Trigger 1987:71).
Any discussions of sequences of change in brass projectile points must be considered alongside the possibility that the objects we call brass points were valued and used for more than their functionality as projectiles. Following Miller and Hammel (1986) and Willison (2016), brass points might have had special spiritual or social significance for certain Indigenous peoples. This possibility also means that brass points might have been “curated” by people in the past or held on to after their functionality as projectiles faded.
Likewise, Morse (1992) mentions several brass projectiles recovered from a seventeenth-century Michigamea village in current-day Arkansas, but he does not describe their respective forms.
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Acknowledgements
I am grateful to two anonymous peer reviewers, who provided useful and constructive feedback that helped me to significantly strengthen this paper. I am also grateful to my former colleagues at the Royal Ontario Museum for supporting this project as well as to the editorial team at the Journal of Archaeological Method & Theory.
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Cipolla, C.N. Concordia salus: Becoming Brass Projectiles. J Archaeol Method Theory 31, 287–310 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-023-09606-9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10816-023-09606-9