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The classic Boggy Branch point has a fully bulbous stem with a rounded basal edge.
Not all Boggy Branch points have a completely rounded bulbous stem. Some examples appear basally thinned, forming a slight concavity along the basal edge.
Some examples that have a broad, flat to rounded basal edge are referred to as a Boggy Branch II.
Name: John Powell first identified the Boggy Branch point from examples in a ten county area of southeastern Alabama and southwestern Georgia.[1]
Age: The long, thick, and narrow blade and serrated edges with basal grinding tend to suggest that the Boggy Branch may be an early Kirk Serrated form. Powell suggested a date range of 8500 BP.
Description: Powell identified two basal structures, one with an “elongated bulbous stem,” and one with a short, ovate stem structure.Both variants have smoothed basal edges typical of Early Archaic blades.The Boggy Branch is a large to medium sized point measuring between 2.5 and 4.5 inches in length.The blade is thick and blade edges are commonly heavily serrated.Most examples are made of Coastal Plains chert.
Distribution: Examples are known from Crisp, Lee, Dougherty, Twigs (figure 6) and Early counties. Boggy Branch points have also been recovered from several Alabama counties.
Information for this article was derived from John S. Whatley, Early Georgia: An overview of Georgia Projectile Points and Selected Cutting Tools, The Society for Georgia Archaeology, Vol. 30, No.1 2002
[1] Powell, John, Points and Blades of the Coastal Plains: A Guide to the Classification of Native American Hafted Implements in the Southeastern Coastal Plain Region. American Systems of the Carolinas, Inc.1990
