Perhaps. I know nothing about the funeral practices of the Native Americans of Michigan. Modern crematory practice uses a temperature between 1400F and 1800F in a gas fueled oven. The upper end of that range is just below the melting point of copper. An ideally laid large wood fueled pyre might produce enough draft to reach a higher temperature.
Gary
Yuri,
Please elaborate.
Tom McDonald
Yuri,
Exactly. So why are you clinging to your wishful thinking, instead of researching the issue?
Tom McDonald
Yuri,
I've been boggled by things you've written before, but this takes the cake. *You* teaching *Gary* anything about metalworking by the ancients. Priceless!
Gary hasn't written that casting was too difficult for ancient peoples to do. Clearly, they did. But in the case of copper in the upper Great Lakes area, copper casting was totally unnecessary. Also, with any even remotely likely technology available to the Indians here, the resulting pure copper casts would be very inferior to the same artifacts made by smithing.
You are trying to tell us that Indians in the Great Lakes Archaic period cast pure copper with techniques that not only perfectly mimicked smith work, but also of such quality that even today it is hard to do so well. You also want us to believe that this technology left no trace other than the artifacts. You finally want to tell us that the Indians, obviously very savvy folks, developed this technology that looks precisely like smithing for no reason whatsoever.
As Gary and Paul have pointed out, the intelligent thing for folks to do with the kind and quality of copper available to them would be to hammer it, using cold hammering and annealing.
If you have evidence of archaeological sites in the upper Great Lakes that show evidence of the technology required (re-read Gary and Paul's posts, and follow the links to the Neubauer Process for what to look for), present it.
Teaching Gary about metalwork :-). Priceless, just priceless.
Tom McDonald
You might GET that temperature but you don't NEED that temperature. See
Eric Stevens
Virtually all of the evidence presented to date in this thread is against casting of ancient Michigan native copper artifacts. If you have conclusive evidence showing characteristic porosity in all the items claimed to be cast, if you have evidence showing a chemical analysis of true alloying between the native copper and other metals (mainly silver) found with it in the halfbreed ore matrix, if you have evidence of large numbers of identically dimensioned artifacts representative of a casting provenance, etc, then present it. Otherwise you have no case.
What we do know is that ancient Michigan artifacts have been found with silver inclusions. That precludes the possibility that they were ever melted. We do know that of the artifacts which have been put forward as evidence of copper casting, all but one do *not* show the characteristic porosity of atmospheric melting of copper, and that one does not appear to be a deliberate casting.
We do know that there is no need to invoke casting as the manufacturing method of any of the artifacts, ie it has been demonstrated that any of them could have been smithed from native copper without casting using tools and techniques known to have been available to the Native Americans of Northern Michigan. And we have the testimony of an experienced coppersmith that casting would have been a greatly inferior method of producing them.
The burden of proof is on you to present incontrovertible evidence that any of the Michigan artifacts were in fact cast. So far, you have not done so.
Gary
Even they don't completely reduce the body to ash. The teeth and several large pieces of bone are left behind, they get run through a ball mill before they return the ashes.
Paul K. Dickman
Funny, I was talking to our local cemetry trustee today about cremation.
They run the burned remains through a magnet and metal detector before the ball mill to take out things like titanium hip joints and other replacement parts. Batteries for pacemakers have to be removed before cremation to eliminate explosions in the furnace.
Earle Rich Mont Vernon, NH
I presume that you regard evidence 'against' as different from lack of evidence 'for'.
What is the evidence 'against' to which you are referring?
What about radiographs cited by Mallery? These have been mentioned several times.
Eric Stevens
Eric,
Gary has discussed this several times. In essence, the radiographs on Connor's web site cited by Mallery were apparently not cast. What Mallery considered bubbles characteristic of cast copper appear to be, with one exception,
*not* the type of bubbles one finds in casts of copper of the purity seen in the artifacts.The sole exception, the artifact labeled R666 (Riverside site artifact number), or 55786 (Milwaukee Public Museum catalog number--where the artifact is curated), does show the typical porosity. However, I don't think anyone thinks that the artifact is an example of intentional casting, but rather of accidental or natural (e.g.: forest fire) melting of a bit of copper.
OTOH, some of the radiographs clearly show annealing twins, and linear voids characteristic of smithing.
This has been discussed before in this thread, perhaps before you returned. If any of this seems new to you, you might want to read the thread in Google groups.
Tom McDonald
Tom, it seems as if you and Gary aren't aware of anything but what's on Connor's website in this question. I know for a fact that Eric has had some of the information Mallery gained by letting Keeler help him to the best metallurgic specialist there was, actually still much more credited than most today. I know also for a fact that Mallery's analysereports aren't in Connor's website, no matter that it contain a lot of other interesting details. As some reading this already knows Mallery's papers are preserved in Keeler's deposit in a private Museum. Lot's of documentation as well as some of the most discussed findings of Mallery and testresults showing beyond any reasonable doubts that we are discussing casting and nothing else what so ever.
I rest there for the moment. Eric hasn't had all information but some essential parts of it.(not sent by me) I will go thru my discs looking for an indexlist I know I have re. the deposit. More later.
Inger E
"Tom McD>
They disagree with you as it states "The casting bubble can clearly been seen...."
In my experience of examples of all kinds - no two are ever identical.
Again, I point to the fact they disagree.
One cant make that claim without investigation, there hasn't been any undertaking by others do examine artefacts for casting. Again I point to the article:
Neiburger said "Further xeroradiographic surveys and analysis of the
25,000 existing copper artifacts from that period (Archic Midwestern United States) are necessary for the determination of how extensively early Native Americans had used melted metal."It doesn't look like any real studies has been done to say casting was NOT practised - or that it was. Personally I don't expect a hell of a lot of casting due to the pure copper being available (even if not always in large lumps) - but I cannot dismiss the evidence, limited as it is, considering the LACK of research undertaken so far.
Are you ignoring completely what is written on that site? I refer you to my reply to Gary for more details.
I see..... so now you are actually editorialising about the information given to you. You claim "accidentally melted" contrary to what has been said. First of all "accidental" heating in a fire is not possible as it doesn't get hot enough. So it requires a forced draught for it to melt, and how the hell do you generate something specifically built for melting as "accidental"?
But only if you ignore claims made on that web site. There is a considerable amount of common sense totally discarded as well - see message by Dickman:
It is actually unlikely any melted copper is actually "pure", but in reality is an alloy - most probably of silver. I have pointed out these problems previously. They are ignored, and a make believe of a cliff of pure copper exists that people come and hack a piece as big as they want from it. See also:
This deals with what I said above. Again this point has been ignored including by yourself - I have noted your replies still harping on pure copper.
Your "don't have sufficient diagnostic" does NOT eliminate one single artefact from potentially being cast. Yet what I see is claims made by researchers being discarded in favour of ignorance, and by the use of ignorance, as that IS what rejecting something as cast on the basis of "don't have sufficient diagnostic" amounts to.
You're funny, Seppo. Don't ever change.
Tom McDonald
My main interest was to show the formation of the copper deposits - the volcanic activity that melted it (and other minerals with it). Silver is/was found in fair quantities alongside the copper. What isn't known - because nobody cares to find out, is the composition of the metal used in the artefacts. It is ASSUMED to be pure copper.
The knowledge of the size of excavations by the ancients suggests vast quantities had already been mined. Only a very small fraction of it has ever been found. The question has been posed, what happened to the rest of it?
One thing we always do is under estimate the ancient people's abilities. How the hell they ever managed to get vast stone slabs dead level and polished to a mirror finish, is hard to comprehend, but they did. The huge stone blocks for the pyramids, cut with copper saws. The fine detail on gold necklaces we would need magnification to see and a brain surgeon's steady hand and modern tools to achieve.....
Knowing that mining was done by the ancient, including under ground mining, then if the above was the case - where are all the piles of copper not found to be suitable?
I don't deny lumps existed - merely that they were rare in comparison to other copper in many forms, oxidised or thin as paper in cracks or embedded in other rock as per the first URL. An axe head requires to be a bit bigger than a chook egg size - more like an Emu egg size!
At village sites there should exist copper scraps in considerable quantities if such was simply discarded as "useless" if not big enough for the task at hand. Nobody has pointed to such as yet at least.
You cannot claim "you have no case" UNLESS you prove there is no "true alloying between the native copper and other metals" and that takes an analysis of the metals in the artefacts found. It works both ways you know.
No, it precludes that item from having been melted only. You cannot extrapolate that beyond the artefact itself.
We see TWO artefacts being claimed as being cast - one being conceded as being cast. We don't know the composition of the metal of the second artefact to be able to discard it as "not cast".
You have claimed it is the sign of "copper" being overheated - ie to melting point else bubbles cannot form. At the same time you have also stated the heat source has to be forced air type to get it hot enough to melt copper.
I see those two statements as being inconsistent with each other. If the Copper was simply hammered and annealed, the temp should NOT be able to get high enough to cause any bubbling.
ON the other hand in the event the fire was of the type for melting copper.... well.... then it would be for melting copper, why else would it be like it?
No, I don't see it like it at all. The alternative is to argue that; without any research we can definitely say none were cast, barring one exception. That of course is illogical as all hell. NO such thing can be claimed at all.
Hang on a sec. What about the first? After all it is THE more important one.
Do you REALLY believe they were cliffs of PURE copper? Note the words "were contained in". Then see the Networks.JPG and you will get an idea of the meaning of the words.
I am aware of one piece of copper 17 ton of it (Yank ton presumably - a short measure). It was found on the bottom of Lake Superior. I'm also aware of another large find of several tons, but a VERY long way underground in a modern mine. Neither kind of find was available to the native people.
The claimed method is not fact - only assumption. The "fact" is the finding a lot of "hammers". They are only proof of pounding or hammering - which can mean crushing of rock containing the copper.
THAT is nonsense. I have provided you with a good example of the nature of it. It isn't the first time I have done it either - and haven't even had to use the same pictures.
Obviously, only you don't know what method they used. Nobody has bothered to find out.
Then you can perhaps point to the huge piles of discarded copper that was useless because it looked like that stuff in the first URL. There have been vast amounts mined by the native people - where are the rejected copper piles?
If the copper is pure is not known because nobody has bothered to find out. Silver does exist with/alongside/embedded in with copper in that area - as are other minerals, including arsenic.
Seppo,
I don't think so. That's why I focused on the other url.
I don't know the matrix enclosing the copper in this sample. However, as you note below, stone hammers would work fine to crush rock containing the copper. Then the copper bits could be picked out of the debitage.
What is the problem? No one has maintained that all the copper used was in the form of pure copper nuggets.
No, of course not. Don't be silly.
Note the words
What is your point? We know that the folks back then eventually had to mine the copper. We know the tools they used to do so. Had most of the copper been in large lumps, the tools used for mining would not have been large stone hammers, wedges, fire, etc.
As Gary has pointed out, it's a bitch to cut pure copper, even with steel tools. Smart folks, like the Indians of those days were (still are, BTW), would most likely have preferred to extract the copper in more manageable sizes.
And nor would they have preferred them if they were available. There is a huge chunk of copper still in a mine, which the ancient Indians tried to extract, but appear to have given up as a bad job. Still, they seemed to do OK without it.
BTW, what is your fascination with size here? It's not really relevant.
Yes, that too. Or do you imagine that the hammers were single-purpose tools?
Re-read (read?) what I wrote directly above the bit you went off on.
Ever heard of 'archaeology'? Or haven't *you* bothered to find that out?
Some is still there. I assume, but do not know, that modern prospectors and miners would have processed such piles, as they would probably have been a good source of copper for smelting. Or do you think that respect for the past would have prevented the modern copper industry from utilizing that resource?
And yet, they did. If you aren't going to read this thread any better than you appear to have done in this sentence, why post?
Silver does exist with/alongside/embedded in with copper in that
Sure. Copper artifacts have been found with just those inclusions. However, silver isn't found in them as an alloy (which might happen if the material were cast), but as inclusions (which would happen if the copper-silver cobble were worked by smithing).
Tom McDonald
Gary showed that the porosity typical of pure cast copper is not present in that artifact. He even explained in just below.
Do you know what 'characteristic' means in this application?
It appears 'they' were mistaken.
Yes, there has. Please note that every artifact that does not show the internal characteristics of melted copper is evidence against that item being cast. And, as Gary and Paul have pointed out, when an artifact shows clear evidence of having been made by smithing, that is evidence against it having been cast.
Again I point
I fully agree, and hope that more such studies are done.
We've been looking at the evidence for a bit now, on this thread. The evidence for casting that's been presented so far appears to have suffered in the course of examination. That said, I would very much like to see more investigation done on this subject.
Seppo, would you care to comment on this last by Gary?
Tom McDonald
And as I note below, they are quite wrong. It is rather obvious that they have little practical experience or knowledge about working native copper. It behaves significantly differently from other metals when melted or cast.
Your authorities are a dentist, an engineer whose expertise is with iron and steel, and one chemist (who disagrees with 4 others at his school). Frankly, not a very impressive collection of authorities on the metallurgy of native copper.
There's a huge gap between "not identical" and grossly dissimilar. The physical chemistry of atmospheric melting of pure copper isn't something you can just wave away, or class as a dispute between quoted sources. It is a physical fact. Anyone who actually works with the metal is well aware of the forms the characteristic porosity take.
The blister they're claiming as evidence of casting simply isn't an example of the characteristic porosity you get when melting copper, which always is a collection of foam-like tiny bubbles deep in the metal. It *is* an example of what happens when you anneal native copper after it has been cold worked.
Pictures of just such blisters are on the pages Tom referenced, where Neubauer used cold work and annealing to produce artifacts like those the ancients produced. In the photos, you see blisters very similar to those being claimed to be evidence of casting on work which has provably not been melted or cast.
Again, I point to the fact that they're simply wrong.
Gary
PolyTech Forum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.