First Drilled Piece - soapstone

[OntarioArch]

Surface find in Cayuga County, NY. Looks to me like a piece of top rim from a soapstone vessel of some kind, with a tapered hole drilled right where a subsequent break happened. Soapstone fragments with drilled holes - probably for wearing as a pendant - are known to be found in our area (Ritchie, et. al.).

 

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[joshuaream]

A lot of soapstone bowls were drilled to repair cracks. (Drill either side of the crack, lash them together, apply pitch or resin glue.)

Some fragments were used for pendants, but you usually see some effort to round over the edges, score the face, add tally marks or shape them a bit.