SpiroMound.com- Spiro Mound Artifact Db- Blades Page

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Spiro Mound Artifact Database

Blades/Knives Page

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Photograph provided by Dr. Robert E. Bell

Blades 1*

Figure 1: The Bell-Townsend-Onken Blade

Many people consider this to be the finest example of Native American flintwork. This artifact was recovered from The Spiro Mound, reportedly by Bill and Hayden Vandagriff, and purchased for $15.00 on the spot by Robert E. Bell for his father’s collection. The blade was broken in one place and was glued together with only a small chip missing, as shown in the photograph taken April 15, 1935. (The chip in the middle of the blade is about one-fourth of the way up from the base.)

According to Dr. Robert E. Bell, the blade is made of colorful Kay County chert from northern Oklahoma. (Proper name is Florence “B” Chert). It is pictured in color in Who’s Who in Indian Relics, #5 (1980), where it is said: “ this 13 1/8 inch flint lance has a maximum thickness at one spot of only 3/8 inch.” It was item # 103 in the Harry T. Bell collection at Marion, Ohio, until July 30, 1956, when Earl C. Townsend, Jr. purchased the Bell collection. It is currently in the collection of Bobby Onken. Mr. Onken has put this piece on display on several occasions to allow interested parties, including the authors, to view it. He has also published pictures of it. The blade is shown in the Townsend collection in Mr. Onken’s Legends of Prehistoric Art, Volume 1, page 97 and will also be featured in Masterpieces of Prehistoric Art- Volume 1. It was also shown in color on the cover of the “Prehistoric American” Volume XXXVII Number 3, 2003. Mr. Onken and others believe it is made of Kaolin flint. Whatever material it is made from, it is one beautiful artifact.

This blade was found in April, 1935. This would be around the time when Dr. Bell took photographs of the diggers at work in the minor cones. Photograph 7 shows them digging in the third cone from the north. W. Guinn Cooper is shown in this picture. In his interview with Dr. James Cherry, Cooper discusses the discovery of what probably is this blade: “and there was a fellow, I was trying to think of his name. I had his picture...he was a professor...He used to come down here all the time...He’s interested in this stuff and he bought one of those long thin, well you’d call it a knife probably...Yeh, it wasn’t flint, I don’t know what it was...but anyhow the old preacher broke it, I remember when he broke it and I pulled it out.” This would account for the fact the piece was broken. Although Dr. Bell said the diggers wouldn’t let outsiders know exactly where items were found, it is safe to assume that this piece came from the third cone from the north in the area shown in Photographs 7 and 11.

* Caption is taken from a black and white photo in The Spiro Mound: A Photo Essay