Union Side Notched

All three of these examples are from the collection of Dr. Jim Tatun.

The Union Side Notched point was named by Ripley Bullen for Union County, Florida. There is no evidence that examples were recovered from this area as Paleoindian points are extremely rare in northeastern Florida. The Union Side Notched is a small to medium sized lanceolate point measuring .75 to2 2.5 inches in length. The blade is developed from a fairly thick blank using random flaking. The thickness of the blank often causes the blade edges to be bi-facially beveled and gives the point a flattened cross-section. The blade edges are excavate from the widest point just above the shallow notches of the hafting area to the points broad distal and. The notches along a hafthng area result more from excessive smoothing rather than a flaked notch formation and can vary in depth and distinction but they never reach the development of the Greenbrier point. The development of this notch and the bi-facial beveling as a form of resharpening lead Jarl Mowan to believe that the Union Side Notched was a transitional type between the Suwannee and Greenbrier points.

The basal corners are small, rounded and very reminiscent of the Suwannee point. They are typically slightly wider than the widest part of the blade due to the shallow side notching and the lack of any wasting in the hafting area. The basal edge is concave and heavily smoothed.

Only recently has the Union Side Notched point been recovered in a stratified, but slightly eroded context, in a site near Orange Lake in Marion County. The same site produced a fluted Clovis point at a similar level only a few feet away. The upper levels of the site contained Kirk serrated points. These recoveries tend to support the late Paleolithic in context of the union side notched point. At least two examples have also been recovered from the 43rd Terrace site near Gainesville, Florida. These examples were located at levels comparable to Bolen point recoveries and much deeper than the middle archaic points for which the site is known. Like many other Florida Paleo points, numerous Union Side Notched points, although uncommon, have been recovered from river contexts. Distribution of this type is limited to the same general area as other late Paleo points from the North-central Florida Highlands to the central Gulf Coast region.