DEVIL PEAK

Tertiary Devil Peak (center) within the Precambrian limestones of the Spring Mountains, Nevada

This source in extreme southern Nevada was discovered independently by Shackley (1988b) and Philip Wilke. Devil Peak is a series of coalesced rhyolite domes of Tertiary age that have extruded through the Paleozoic Monte Cristo Limestones of the Spring Mountains (Longwell et al. 1965). Devil Peak is located on Stateline Pass 7.5' Provisional Quad 1985 near the center of the sheet. Here nodules are found in situ in a perlite matrix on both the east and west sides of the peak eroding into either the interior drainage basins of Mesquite Lake on the west or Roach Lake on the east. Historic perlite mining on both sides of the peak has essentially destroyed any evidence of prehistoric production. Some tool manufacturing debris was noted in the alluvium east of the peak toward Roach Lake (Shackley 1988b; Wilke: personal communication 1993). The archaeological context of the eastern locus is now designated site 26-CK-3865 (Shackley 1988b).

Perlite matrix with in situ marekenites is located on the west near the Umpire Perlite Mines between UTM 3952000 and 3951000/637000 and 639000 (no sections on map). Perlite matrix with in situ marekenites is located on a series of very small rhyolite domes on the east flank of the Spring Mountains between UTM 3953000 and 3951000/642000 and 644000 all on the Stateline Pass 7.5' Provisional Quad 1985. The density of nodules in both areas in the perlite is up to 100 per m2, although most of the marekenites are less than 30 mm in diameter. Nodules up to 100 mm in diameter have been recovered, but most are less than 40 mm. The density of nodules on the east shoreline of Mesquite Lake is about 1 per 20 m2, and about 1 per 100 m2 on the shoreline of Roach Lake to the east. Significant chemical differences in some trace elements exist between obsidian from the east and west sides of Devil Peak. The nodules on the west side are generally superior media for tool production than those on the east. The "western" marekenites are generally more translucent and brittle, while the "eastern" nodules tend to be less vitreous, opaque and contain some plagioclase or sanidine phenocrysts. This may be due to wall rock reactions with the limestone during eruptive events on the east with the small dome structures. Bipolar cores and flakes occurred rarely, in part no doubt due to the perlite mining in the area. The only published references known are Longwell et al. (1965), and Shackley (1988b). This source was reported in the Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology (Shackley 1994). The elemental composition of the two sources are quite different as can be seen in the mean and central tendency tables below.

Raw elemental concentrations for Devil Peak East (E) and West (W) source standards. All measurements in parts per million (ppm).

SAMPLE	Ti	Mn	Fe	Pb	Rb	Sr	Y	Zr	Nb	Ba	La	Ce
E	572	590	8780	44	210	109	30	105	23	315	55	101
E	557	535	8271	37	194	105	30	102	27	330	55	107
E	595	584	8559	43	206	106	27	106	21	354	65	116
E	753	784	10410	52	233	125	34	116	27	323	59	107
E	616	566	8554	39	200	109	33	110	23	348	61	108
E	565	586	8323	35	197	106	25	106	24	303	54	108
E	642	597	8800	44	194	103	25	108	26	415	73	142
E	583	599	8532	39	203	105	29	105	26	406	71	133
E	626	608	8895	47	210	113	26	111	31	301	52	103
E	502	550	8221	44	195	101	28	106	25	331	50	107
E	571	556	8033	39	194	103	27	109	24
E	570	547	8092	40	197	106	28	109	26
E	722	586	8372	44	204	107	28	108	25
E	628	585	8379	41	195	108	30	105	23
E	666	627	8739	45	212	114	35	110	29
E	577	574	8146	38	197	104	27	103	26
E	689	651	8933	40	204	111	31	108	25
E	583	577	8022	38	193	105	31	105	26
E	564	542	8031	39	189	106	31	102	26
E	617	542	8051	40	194	108	32	106	23
E	671	585	8294	39	199	108	32	107	25
E	624	558	8117	40	191	103	28	103	27
E	642	552	8068	37	193	103	31	104	22
E	612	645	8912	43	211	113	31	111	27
E	654	553	8256	42	200	109	31	108	25
E	542	546	7798	36	183	103	29	104	26
E	782	701	9662	43	210	115	34	110	27
E	696	580	8606	47	210	117	32	109	33
E	738	602	8553	43	206	112	28	109	25
E	616	621	8585	30	205	113	29	109	28
E	693	553	7820	29	194	105	29	106	20
E	628	567	8290	30	200	108	32	108	25
E	516	533	7883		194	111	26	107	29	346
E	653	596	9423		195	163	26	133	26	505
E	693	633	8630		211	111	27	107	27	344
E	675	548	7997		195	106	28	108	23	331
E	624	584	8588		214	113	32	111	27	352
E	636	612	8227		198	107	29	106	22	336
E	799	582	9238		204	146	23	126	24	439
E	669	624	8394		197	110	27	107	26	334
E	614	564	8273		199	111	29	110	26	343
E	640	574	8134		196	110	28	112	28	353
E	743	809	9597		241	101	35	107	31	234
E	509	533	7623		184	100	28	104	25	334
E	503	600	8113		201	107	30	111	26	343
E	610	591	8176		197	107	28	109	27	317
W	806	469	9133	37	160	236	23	146	20	975	104	178
W	835	577	10499	44	188	260	26	163	20	1073	106	204
W	990	590	10853	43	194	266	27	161	22	884	94	163
W	605	413	8661	35	158	230	25	145	23	924	91	173
W	806	548	9941	43	180	253	25	160	22	777	80	146
W	824	530	10278	45	181	261	29	167	24	745	73	144
W	941	568	10702	45	188	261	27	159	25	821	83	154
W	768	516	9521	37	174	245	27	152	25	862	84	165
W	758	550	9923	42	179	253	23	155	24	807	74	148
W	710	516	9339	36	172	247	26	153	20	830	77	159
W	828	565	10287		183	259	26	157	26	762
W	893	524	10162		182	250	25	153	24	1193
W	737	516	9628		173	244	26	152	23	898
W	958	612	10552		183	252	28	156	23	812
W	771	577	10158		184	253	25	153	25	777

Mean and central tendency for Devil Peak East source standard elemental concentrations

	N	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Std. Deviation
Ti	46	502	799	630.0	70.8
Mn	46	533	809	592.0	56.1
Fe	46	7623	10410	8465.2	538.5
Rb	46	183	241	201.1	10.6
Sr	46	100	163	110.1	10.8
Y	46	23	35	29.3	2.7
Zr	46	102	133	108.4	5.4
Nb	46	20	33	25.7	2.5
Ba	24	234	505	347.4	52.0
La	10	50	73	59.5	7.9
Ce	10	101	142	113.2	13.5
Pb	32	29	52	40.2	5.0

Mean and central tendency for Devil Peak West source standard elemental concentrations

	N	Minimum	Maximum	Mean	Std. Deviation
Ti	15	605	990	815.3	100.9
Mn	15	413	612	538.1	50.1
Fe	15	8661	10853	9975.8	617.3
Rb	15	158	194	178.6	9.9
Sr	15	230	266	251.3	9.8
Y	15	23	29	25.9	1.6
Zr	15	145	167	155.5	6.0
Nb	15	20	26	23.1	1.9
Ba	15	745	1193	876.0	124.2
La	10	73	106	86.6	11.8
Ce	10	144	204	163.4	18.2
Pb	10	35	45	40.7	4.0