Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology

The Channel Islands Barbed point type occurs on the three larger northern Channel Islands off the coast of southern California. The points are small, unusually thin, and carefully knapped, and occur in archaeological assemblages dating between 12,100 and 7,800 cal B.P. Based on points of this type in museum collections compiled during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century and a lesser number from recent investigations, we present a typology of Channel Islands Barbed points consisting of seven subtypes, with the objective of facilitating investigation into their spatio­temporal patterning. The delicate character of the points implies that the spears or darts on which they were hafted were used to acquire fauna in aquatic environments or were thrust rather than thrown, given that they would be highly vulnerable to breakage if thrown on land. Although having a very limited geographic distribution, the Channel Islands Barbed point type is comparable in quality of knapping to other Paleoindian and early Archaic types found elsewhere in North America.