The Organization of Chipped-Stone Economies at Piedras Negras ...

face of the core. Clark and Bryant (1997:116) did mention the occurrence of one-step
distal modification but did not discuss it in detail.
While the proper removal of a prismatic blade from a core can be considered a
difficult endeavor, it is by no means the most complicated or the most crucial aspect of
blade production. In fact, core preparation, platform preparation, and core maintenance
are much more time-intensive and require a great deal of learned skill to perform. The
removal of initial percussion flakes and blades to regularize the core are among the most
important and demanding steps in the blade-making process. An error at this stage could
endanger the bulk of the core, and greatly reduce the number of blades produced from it.
These initial flakes and blades were among the most common blanks used for obsidian
cache eccentrics.
6.3: BLADE-CORE REDUCTION ON ONE OR MORE SIDES OF THE CORE
This section describes a reduction technique of imported blade-cores on one or
more sides, but not in the round (i.e., the reduction of pressure-blade cores in a more or
less circular or centripetal fashion on all sides of the core). I begin by outlining the
percussion strategies used to regularize the percussion-prepared cores imported to the site
and continue with the pressure techniques.
Most of the blade-cores exported from the highland Guatemala sources were
roughly circular in cross section (Figure 6.4). There are no examples of bifacial or flat
blade-cores prepared by percussion from either El Chayal or San Martín Jilotepeque.
Hence, it is most likely that cores imported to Piedras Negras began with a circular cross
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