The Hogeye Clovis Cache by Michael R. Waters, Thomas A. Jennings (review)

Caching is a well-known Clovis trait in the Great Plains. Lithic assemblages in these caches vary considerably. The Hogeye Clovis cache, consisting of 52 bifaces (37 displaced by quarrying in 2003, plus 15 recovered in 2010, also from disturbed contexts), is distinctive in consisting only of late-stage bifaces and projectile-point preforms, all of Edwards chert. The find site, circumstances of discovery, descriptions of the bifaces, and analyses of the cache are detailed. Conclusions and discussions address Clovis bifacial technology and caching behavior.

The locality, a 3-meter-deep commercial sandpit at the southern tip of the midgrass plains, is in Bastrop County, Texas. Investigations in 2010 inferred the predisturbance context of the cache at the base of the sand and indicated a Late Pleistocene age. The 52 cache pieces likely represent most of the original cache. Some pieces were broken by quarry operations. Missing fragments show that recovery efforts were not completely successful.

Both faces and longitudinal profile of each of these items, plus a finished Clovis point found in the quarry in 1993, are illustrated with color photographs and line drawings. Text and tables present technological details. Two groups are identified: 47 projectile-point trajectory bifaces and five ovate bifaces. These data are assessed and summarized for size, shape, thinning techniques, flaking patterns, and chert sourcing, leading to a comparison of the Hogeye Clovis with selected data from one area of the Gault site, 75 kilometers to the northwest.

This report affords another strong refutation of recent claims that overshot flaking in Clovis was accidental. Of 52 Hogeye preforms, 26 exhibit a total of at least 50 successful, controlled overshot flake scars. A good discussion of caching functions is presented, and Hogeye is inferred to be an insurance cache. The monograph ends with a whimsical, imaginary “just so” story of the people who secreted this cache.

In spite of its several strong points, I offer caveats to anyone reading this book. It is suggested (132–33) that this cache may have been made on chert from the vicinity of the Gault site and possibly manufactured in Area 8 of the Gault site. This is based in part on a 2011 preliminary chert-sourcing analysis of six Hogeye bifaces (HC4, 5, 6, 28, 30, and 39) by Charles Speer. Speer’s subsequent, more reliable analyses (pers. comm. December 13, 2015) no longer support this specific inference and, therefore, undermine details of several interpretations and conclusions.

Certain claims are simply exaggerated. Comparisons of Hogeye are made only with the Gault site Clovis assemblage from Area 8 (132–44) and rely upon only 11 bifaces (of 336 from the entire site), and upon published data on 33 projectile points (of 40). Statements of the significance of these comparisons (such as Hogeye filling a gap in Clovis preform reduction [132] or the observation that Clovis knappers generally ceased removal of overshot and overface flakes prior to the final stage of point production [135]) are new in the narrow realm of Gault and Hogeye assemblages, but not in the broader universe of Clovis assemblages. Thus the “expanded understanding of Clovis biface production” (137) is limited. These overstatements, however, do not detract from the fact that this is an excellent report on an extraordinary addition to our data on Clovis caching.