The primary objective of this study is to understand how the introduction of European flntlock ignition technology with its associated gunflint manufacture influenced Native American lithic technological traditions. Gunflints are an outstanding tool for interpreting cross-cultural relationships, this is owed to their permanence in the archaeological record along with their consistently fixed chronology. Additionally, gunflint assemblages can be inferred as an indirect indication of firearm caches stored at Native American archaeological sites.

A review of existing literature on the origins and technological evolution of the flintlock firing mechanism was conducted from pyrite nodules, to gunspalls, to blade gunflints with an emphasis on how European gunflint export changed traditional Native American stone tool making. How did indigenous peoples absorb and adapt to these new technologies?

To this end, eighteen gunflints, six modern British blade, six French D-shaped and six Native American bifacial gunflints were either purchase [sic] or personally manufactured and fired. The resulting use-wear was microscopically analyzed, compared, and recorded. The experimental data produced a set of diagnostic characteristics specific to gunflint use.

Following the experimental portion of this study, a predictive model was produced and applied to use-wear and functional analysis of appropriate Native American lithics in archaeological collections from a broad geographic area spanning all North America to revaluate [sic] previously misidentified lithic artifacts as having been used as gunflints.