The Spreen Cache: A Case Study of a Prehistoric Curated Collection of Broken Tools from 41RN108, Runnels County, Texas

ABSTRACT

Testing at the Spreen Site, 41RN108, in west-central Texas, located a cache of 31 thin bifaces, 6 scrapers 1 point/knife base, and 1 core. All were made from locally available gravels. Eighty percent of the implements were broken. The types of breakage suggest that many, although not all, failed during manufacture. The context of the tools, the occurrence of heat-spalled tools, wear on edges of broken implements, temporally distinct resharpening episodes, and the absence of refitable pieces suggest that these implements were prehistorically collected. The recovery and caching of potentially serviceable tool fragments from a relatively chert-rich region is interpreted as representing labor-saving opportunities too good to ignore. The cache suggests that prehistoric scavenging of discarded tools and late stage manufacturing rejects may have been a common practice. The cache example provides a cautionary lesson about the value of broken implements and the reuse of generalized preforms.