A Further Note on Lithic Heat-treating in Northwestern California

There are two areas of Gould's paper which I believe call for further comment. I find to be of most interest Gould's statement on p. 143:The possibility thus exists that cobbles of agate and jasper were collected by Indians from the beaches and placed in fires, perhaps solely for the purpose of lithic reduction or perhaps in connection with stone-boiling of water and acorn gruel.... No careful effort was made by the Indians to control the rate at which the agate and jasper cobbles were heated and cooled, so many cobbles shattered into useless fragments....With this, and following statements, Gould sets forth a "hypothetical lithic reduction sequence" for the Point St. George site