For immediate release: 08/09/2007

Contact: Alexandria Archaeology, 703-838-4399

Alexandria Archaeologists Discover 13,000-Year-Old Artifact

Prehistoric Stone Tool Found at Freedmen's Cemetery Identified as Clovis Point

Last week archaeologists working at Freedmen's Cemetery in Alexandria unearthed a stone tool believed to be about 13,000 years old. Although the tip of the spear point is broken, archaeologists from Alexandria and Fairfax have identified it as a reworked Clovis point. Clovis points are recognized by their distinctive shape and serve as one of the diagnostic markers for an era known to archaeologists as the Paleoindian period that lasted from as early as 18,000 to about 12,000 years ago.

Until this discovery, the oldest known Alexandria artifact was a 9,000-year-old Kirk point found at Jones Point. According to Francine Bromberg, Alexandria's preservation archaeologist, the Clovis point provides the first concrete evidence that Native Americans were present in Alexandria during the Paleoindian period. Clovis points were manufactured and used by bands of hunters as they roamed the grasslands and open conifer forests that would have been present in Northern Virginia as the glaciers from the last Ice Age began to melt.

Michael Johnson, an archaeologist for Fairfax County, has examined several stone artifacts found at Freedmen's Cemetery and believes the location was once a major Native American site. Johnson, a leading authority on lithic technology (stone tool manufacturing), concluded that the broken point was originally a Clovis spear point that had been reworked or re-sharpened so it could continue to be an effective tool. It appears that when the tip broke off during reworking, or lithic reduction, the user abandoned it. Clovis is often identified by its ground, concave base, bifacial blade, and fluted channel, which allowed the point to be hafted or attached to a spear.

"My first impression at seeing the point was, 'How cool'," says Johnson. "It goes to show that if you do the right thing, as Alexandria has done over the last 30 years, eventually you'll find some truly great things. This is only one of many that have been found in Alexandria. However, for me the Clovis point and site were really special."

Alexandria archaeologists have been working at Freedmen's Cemetery since May, excavating the site where approximately 1,800 African Americans were buried in the late 1860s. The cemetery was abandoned and forgotten, and a gas station and office building were later built on top of it. Historians later found documentary evidence of the cemetery, and the City acquired the property earlier this year and tore down the gas station and office building. Since then, a team of archaeologists has been carefully excavating the property, identifying grave shafts without disturbing any burials or remains. The goal of the archaeological work is to find the burial locations so that a memorial park honoring the freedmen can be designed and built without disturbing any graves.

In digging the cemetery site, archaeologists have also found extensive evidence of prehistoric occupation. In addition to several points, they have unearthed a significant concentration of quartz and quartzite flakes, the slivers of rock that are chipped away when stone tools are created. Archaeologists believe that the location overlooking Hunting Creek would have been an ideal one for Native Americans to work stone tools for hunting, fishing and other uses. Initial investigation supports the likelihood that it was a major prehistoric site, periodically visited and probably occupied by different peoples for thousands of years.

Archaeological work at Freedmen's Cemetery, located at South Washington and Church streets, is expected to continue into October. For more information, please contact Alexandria Archaeology at 703-838-4399.

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