Indian Relic Fossil Shell?

[ozzyrules244]

I found this in a field where I find arrowheads no other shells are around that I have seen it appears to be fossilized oyster any ideas?

[micropterus101]

Appears to a jingle shell and Indians did where them. At least the indians in a movie I saw once did.

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[JohnJ]

Ozzy,

If the hole shows beveling from both sides, it is likely modified by people. There are so many factors to consider before saying something was modified by humans. Finding other artifacts and not finding more shell refuse in the area help the supposition it could be an artifact. Still, this is all speculation from afar.

[tracer]

can't tell from the shell material how old it is. context and total evidence of modification is everything in trying to figure out if something was altered by a human, as opposed to the perfect holes frequently found in bivalves that were caused by predatory gastropods. as johnj said, a hole tapered on *both* sides would be an indicator that a human might have been at work. a perfect hole near a valve hinge tapered only on the outside would be much more likely to have been the work of something like a shark eye moon snail, and a perfect non-tapered hole by something like an oyster drill (stramonita sp).

course humans still pick up such shells and wear them, so wear patterns can be an indicator of human usage, if not human modification. lots of stuff ends up being sort of in the category of "probably so" or "probably not".