Materials Example 4, AMNH D/144
Southern Ovate bannerstone; Florida, oolitic limestone, h. 10.1 w. 13.3 cm.
Bannerstones carved in sedimentary rock are less commonly found in current collections. The fragility of the rock may have made it less desirable to the Archaic sculptors or less likely to remain intact over thousands of years. AMNH D/144 is a Southern Ovate carved from oolitic limestone that was one of eight bannerstones excavated from a burial mound in Tomoka Creek Florida by A.E. Douglass in the spring of 1881.[2] This was one of two bannerstones in the burial made of limestone. The others were carved from fine or medium-grained metamorphic rock. The detail of the stone reveals its porous nature and the subsequent accumulation of soil and other materials easily imbedded into its soft surface.
[2] A.E. Douglass, “A Find of Ceremonial Axes in a Florida Mound,” The American Antiquarian and Oriental Journal 4 (1882): 104.