What % of Indian Relics have been found vs still UNDISCOVERED?

[closecaller]

O.K. you much wiser than me Indian Relic wise men - I got a good question for you that I have often wondered about.   What % of Indian Relics that existed in and on the ground and under the water when the Native Americans dissapeared from the scene are now IN the hands of collectors versus still "out there" waiting to be found?   Do you think  we have found 1/2 of them or 1/3 of them or what %?  I'll kick it off by saying that we have found less than 10%  probably way less than 10%!!  This is Ron in Maryland.  Here our huge Chesapeake Bay is FULL of artifacts many, hundreds of yards from the current eroded shoreline.  There they sit under the water under the mud and silt, once in a while found by clammers or oyster tongers.  Many tens of thousands more under developements and the towns - you know most towns were built upon and over the existing large village sites as the Indians knew the "best places" to live!  We have many old stories of awesome artifacts being bulldozed out and paved over when the roads were being put in the towns and developements.  Plus in other states like down in South Carolina where the army corps of engineers put in monsterous huge tens of thousands of acre lakes for electric power over 50 years ago, at least a dozen all over the state.  How many artifacts do you think are under THAT water from 1 to 50 ft deep?  So whatcha think - how many more are waiting for us to give a new home to?

[David Earhart]

Just imagine how many sites there are in the millions of acres of forest and woodlands. Several years ago during a drought, there was a site that had been hunted for years that produced several thousand artifacts, and still holds probably a million in the surrounding area. I would say less than 5 percent have been found. Hows that for a "finite" resource? Just my unsubstantiated opinion!

[Indianasmith]

Greg Perino, who knew a thing or two about artifacts, used to say that he thought maybe 10% of the total had been recovered.  That number might be a few points higher now.

[joshuaream]

The easy answer is that 100% of undiscovered relics haven't been found yet...

I'd say for certain later cultures and relic types, most (but not all) that could be found have been found.  An example would be Spiro mound points, or Hopewell pipes.  Yes, isolated examples come up every now and then, but the major sites have been excavated.

It also depends on the site/artifact type, I could take you to a site in Indiana where you could rake up dime sized pieces of old pottery, but probably never find anything else.  So on that site, which was completely dug out in the 40's and 50's, there are still millions of relics, but not really anything most collectors look for.

At the other end of the spectrum, I agree with you that along coastal areas there are untold numbers of items waiting to be found.  Also, surface hunters are typically only getting the top several inches of soil.  I've seen excavations on farm land that has been plowed for generations where the stratigraphy is undisturbed 18 inches down.  Sometimes our played out fields, are really just played out plow zones.

I'll say that in some areas, more paleo are being found now than at almost any other time (which the exception of the dust bowl when vast areas were uncovered.)  If you look back at collections from the 50's, the number of clovis points was tiny.  Now, I'd say the majority of us have found a paleo point and know some one who has found a clovis.  One of the big flaws in the Clovis first theory is that they are just too darn common over too big an area to have been the first point.  (Seriously, when the known number of clovis points was around 1000 pieces it was easier to picture them being the pioneers.)

There have been several attempts to document the population before Columbus, and one of them was looking at flint quarries.  I can't remember the exact numbers, but someone calculated that during prehistoric times Indians dug about 1000 acres of the flintridge quarry in Ohio with an average of thickness 4 to 5 feet of flint.  If that were piled on a single foot ball field, it would be a pile of flint about a mile high.  They came up with a complex formula for quarry waste, rind, waste debitage, etc. but still came up with millions and millions of tools made over the last several thousand years.  How many have been found?  A lot, but probably not close to 50%.  And Flintridge really doesn't even compare in size to the Burlington, Edwards or Dover quarries which an almost exponentially bigger area than flintridge.

I think the future limiting factor for collectors on relics isn't the number relics left to be found, it's access to the ground where they could still be found.  Some areas like the paleo shorelines just aren't huntable via regular means, and given the needle in the haystack nature of hunting, no one has spent the time scuba diving to thousands of hours to find the pieces.  Other areas of public and private land are no longer accessable either.  i.e. We'll run out of places to hunt before we run out of relics to find.

[Rich]

Granted, many known sites that hunters have hunted for years will be pretty well thinned out. However, nationwide I contend that less than 1% have been found.

[Chris Peters]

I agree with nearly everything that has been said here, and will put my vote in somewhere between 1-10%.
Just in my hunting areas I believe if many spots were dug or turned 2-3 feet deep, there'd be an amazing amount of points, etc. exposed.
Chris

[Creekcomber]

I am not sure, but it really begs the question, of how many people lived in the ancient past here in North America, as that would be what artifacts/burials were in existance here, and would give us a glimpse as to what might be left to discover. However, depending on your philosophy/education/experience/beliefs/what book you read/your interpretation of the fossil record, that question appears to have many answers.  I am fairly certain, just by my experiences, that there were a tremendous amount of people alive and surviving, as I have two different MULTI-COMPONENT fields in particular where I know for a fact they have been hunted to death, and they keep kicking up points from all different periods, and they are made from a plethora of widely distributed materials, including local ones of course.  But, I guess what I am saying is this:  I think that we have only scratched the surface, (no pun intended) with the information that is out there.  I would say that the discoverers before us have built a practical and working foundation that technology and science can improve the methods and interpretation of those sites.   I would agree that some of the major "Mississippian" sites have already been found, but certainly not that of significant Paleo Eras or any "undiscovered" cultures(pre-clovis/cumberland), at least not enough to satisfy my curiosity. For instance, the Cumberland culture points are only found basically east of the Mississippi, and clovis is pretty much everywhere... Did the cumberland culture just fall out of the sky and into Kentucky?  These are some of the questions that keep me out there hunting/studying/ and talking with others about this stuff, it can't just be all about the big arrowhead, for me at least.  Anyway, this was a really good post closecaller! Thanks

[Steve Valentine]

You have to take into account that these early people had been here for by some estimates close to 15,000 years before the white man arrived. That's 15,000 years worth of discarded and lost artifacts and no matter how long we hunt we will never find them all. Like others have said, some are lost in the wilderness that we rarely venture into anymore and some are still deep in the ground below the plow zone that will never see the light of day unless they are excavated since farmers just barely scratch the surface of their field nowadays. I sure there are complete camp and village sites that have never been discovered and may never be discovered that are in some of these wilderness areas. Hell, look at what just came about in the last few years with the discovery of the canyon in Utah with all of the Fremont culture sites.

[closecaller]

This is a lively and very interesting discussion I have sparked.  In thinking and listening I suspect that with all the artifacts we HAVE found - it is most likely way LESS than 1% of what there was/is out there still!   Just look at New York city and all the big cities - almost all were built over old Indian village sites.  IMAGINE the artifacts that are under that concrete and under all of our towns that lie on or near the banks of rivers and river intersections.  And the endless campsites that lie under the great man made lakes all over this land.  God there must have been a lot more Native People than we really think or imagine there were to have made SO many artifacts!!  And I have tried hard to Knapp points from easy to Knapp Obsidian and had very little luck.  These guys and gals just grabbed some rock or pebble or core of flint and had at it.  And think of how MANY had to be Very adept at knocking out point after point after point!!!  Boggles the mind to try to fathom it and fathom just HOW many there are yet to be found!  I, in my youth have found over 100 pieces total in one day kicking around on some local sandy hills next to our inland little streams after spring plowing and hard spring rains!  NO tellin what and how much IS out there.

[Gomer]

I truly believe no one has even a good clue of how many artifacts have been made by man since day one This also means no one has a good clue of what is left from day one till whenever.  I would think its more to a classification of endless. Humans by natur are trashing people leaving something where ever they are or have been.

[Chris Peters]

Something KH brought up interested me. The amount of multicultural sites around. I have one small knoll of a hill (about 1/2 acre) that has given up everything from Madisons to broken Dalton/Paleo pieces. I guess a good spot is a good spot. Or do you think these campsite locations were learned from generation to generation, and just a regular stop on their seasonal relocations?
Chris

[Dustin Wise]

From what I have gathered, my opinion would be less than 5% have been found.  Joshua brought up a great comment on the plow zone.  Here in Eastern CO when when a couple of inches blows off a field you can find woodland and archaic and an occasional paleo piece, but most of the paleo is deeper down in the soils that has not blown out yet except for the good ol' days during the 30's and 50's.  We do get an occasional blow out but nothing like it used to be due to enhanced farming practices and conservation practices.  Another great point that was brought up was getting access to land and that is the biggest problem that we all face, including good turkey hunting Ron!  This is a well kept secret out here as access is even getting hard for locals.

[Justin Phillips]

It is a funny thing you brought up this topic. I have always said that on my main camp sites there was someone there atleast once a year. To those of you who dont know I am in West Texas and our Natives were nomads who followed the buffalo herds. Now with that said, there was some 15000 or so years, give or take, that there was some travel across and through here. That means that if there was atleast 1 point dropped per year then I have about 14000 more points to find per major camp. In other words, I will be looking for points the rest of my life.....

[Chris Peters]

Now that's what I call optimism Justin!!
But your point (though tongue in cheek) has a good amount of truth to it. I believe these nomadic tribes (clans, groups, whatever) re-used good camp locations. Even a group unfamiliar with the area could probably recognize that others had used the spot before, and may have utilized pits, etc. left behind. Also it's just common sense; a good spot is a good spot!
Chris

[Justin Phillips]

Well Chris, it is a fact that many of the same groups used the same spots year after year. And when it comes to using the same hills, ours used the same spots for thousands of years. We can find Clovis, Any kind of Archaics, and arrowpoints like Harrells on the same hills. And in historic times, Quanah Parker made his yearly rounds to some salt lakes to the east of us.