Native American Copper Molds

Yuri,

The 'crucible-like vessels' at Cahokia aren't described as being in relationship to any source of sufficient heat to melt copper. If the vessels were used in metalworking (and not, for instance, to cook the copper workers' lunch), on the given evidence it seems more likely that copper might have been heated in the crucibles for hot-working (which NA are known to have done). If further study suggests copper casting at Cahokia, I'd like to see it.

The 'broken mold' at the Garrett site has one expert thinking it's a casting, and another disagreeing with him/her. (Any idea who these folks are?) I'd be interested in ideas as to why the iron in the cast wasn't re-used; certainly the utility of doing so is as great there as at Cahokia, where there are reportedly no copper scraps.

I've also seen another 'mold', made of clay, on one of the websites I've been madly dashing around to on this subject. The photo wasn't clear, but I could see what might have been molds.

So far, the evidence I've seen isn't compelling for casting copper in NANOM. OTOH, there is voluminous evidence for the use of native copper without melting it, and experimental evidence that has shown that all of the types of tools and ornaments of copper in the Great Lakes area can be made by cold and hot (not melting) techniques.

The burden of proof here is on your side. So far, I'm not impressed by any of it except perhaps the xeroradiograph evidence, and possibly the metallurgy. However, as the url Doug gave today pointed out, extensive testing and examination of the copper artifacts in question have not shown evidence of casting.

The thought is already dead; you're flogging its ghost.

Tom McDonald

Tom McDonald wrote in article :

Well, then you must have been sleeping while all the evidence was being presented here. Such as the stuff from Eric that I've reposted here,

"Copper Casting In Ancient America - Part 2"

This isn't the game of 'spot the mold in this picture'. I'm not going to argue with certain biased individuals here about what looks like a mold, and what doesn't look like a mold. That's a mug's game. Anyone can deny anything in regard to a visual identification of an object of such a type.

The discussion that I started is strictly in regard to copper casting in ancient America. This I think is beyond any doubt at this stage. There are all those ancient furnaces, hundreds of them. They must have been smelting (or melting) something.

This whole side-track about molds was only to answer Tom's question. Some possible molds have been found, so live with it. He apparently hasn't heard of any of it, and that was the only thing that needed to be shown. Another clued out expert.

If all those metallurgical experts have identified all those cast copper objects, then I conclude that there must have been molds.

If the American archaeologists, haven't yet found any molds, too bad for them. This isn't the only thing that this merry bunch of sleep-walkers has missed -- far from it...

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky -=O=-

Yuri, this is just an opinion, but I wonder if you aren't attaching more significance to the question of whether Indians cast copper than it deserves -- at least, in terms of measuring their technical competence. I'm sure it's important in historical terms or cultural terms, or some darned terms, but, as someone who has lived with metals and industrial history all of his working life, I don't consider basic casting to be indicative of very much about a culture's technology.

It's a simple thing to do, relatively speaking, once you have the metal. Most cultures discovered that you can melt metals in some kind of furnace, by burning charcoal in a strong draft of air. Sometimes the air was supplied by blow-pipe. Sometimes by means of a goat-skin bellows. Sometimes, as with the myriad types of cupola furnaces that have been built around the world, by natural draft in a tall column.

Smelting ore is another kettle of fish -- or hematite, or whatever. Making more sophisticated metal tools, whether by forging or by casting, also suggests more sophistication to me.

And closed-mold casting, as Central American Indians apparently did, also suggests more sophistication. I have read that pre-Columbian C.A. Indians even knew lost-wax (investment) casting.

This is not to belittle the accomplishments of North American Indians, especially if they developed casting in isolation. But it's a small step in a culture's technological advancement. The underground mining conducted by Indians on the Keewenaw Peninsula, as I've read today in the course of finding out what else they did, impresses me more than basic casting.

Ed Huntress

Then why did you post a link to an alleged *iron* mold?

tk

Hello, Ed,

Yes, I understand what you're saying, but you have to see this whole matter in the context of what sort of a group sci.arch is.

This is a real snake-pit of denialism, in so far as the subject of discussion may have anything to do with Native American creativity.

So you cannot treat this discussion in isolation. These folks have a very long track record of doing the same thing over and over again...

If you propose anything having to do with the Native Americans being seen as sophisticated in any way, the burden of proof will be on you, and this burden is like a ton of bricks. :)

That's why one needs to start with little things. Otherwise, these guys will ridicule you to no end. As you can see, I've started small, but they are still trying to ridicule and belittle what I'm saying!

But the joke is on them this time, I'm afraid...

What you see happening in sci.arch is just a small part of these racist presuppositions that are so prevalent in N American archaeology.

Sure, it's a simple thing to do but, if we listen to these bigoted denialists, no thing will ever be too small for the Native Americans not being able to get it. :(

Well, I believe that the Native Americans also knew how to smelt ores, but it'll have to be one thing at a time. Remember about that burden of proof...

Yes, all that has been confirmed, but I guess one doesn't see the same racist presuppositions in Central or South American archaeology, or at least not to the same extent.

The history of North American Indians is full of deceptions and cover-ups. They were far more sophisticated culturally than our highly bigoted archaeological establishment would allow.

There's quite a bit of evidence for iron smelting, for example. There are various Native writing systems that are being dismissed and covered up. The list just goes on and on...

All the best,

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky -=O=-

But scientists, who ought to know Assure us that it must be so. Oh, let us never, never doubt What nobody is sure about. -- Hilaire Belloc

There seems to be some connection between the two. Think on it for a few hours, maybe you'll get it...

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto -=O=-

On Wed, 26 May 2004 13:39:01 -0400, Yuri Kuchinsky wrote: [SNIP]

Native Americans had very sophisticated cultures and technologies.

But note that Yuri has already posted his claims that the copper working technologies were *brought* to the Americas from the Old World. Not invented by Native Americans.

But he gets out of this apparent contradiction by claiming that these Old World people became Native Americans. I have posted this several times this month and I know that Yuri and Seppo say it's a lie. However:

Message-ID: #1/1

"Even if there was such very early Mediterranean influence in S America, after a few generations they become native Americans. So those "moving on to the Pacific islands" will have been Native Americans. Case closed."

It is Yuri that argues that many supposedly native inventions were brought to the Americas from across the Atlantic (or Pacific), and denies that they were indigenous.

Doug

Again it is quite impossible to know what the hell Douggie is on about. If I have said something is a lie, then it is - whatever it was, though it is impossible to trust Doug's claims when he does not provide references. Eg below, the text has been taken out of context.

we'll restore the context:

This is Doug: : Not obfuscation. I've read some of his [Heyerdahl] stuff. What he explicitly refers : to, and you seem to support him in this,

Yuri: No, I don't.

: is peoples bringing techniques : from the Ancient Near East, teaching them to native South Americans, and : then moving on to the Pacific islands.

Yuri: The _same people_ doing all this??? You seem to have some pretty bizarre views about ancient history. Yuri:

So it is clear the text has been blatantly abused and attributed a meaning by Doug it does NOT have. That IS the style Doug resorts to and hence cannot be believed.

....which is actually a LIE by Doug as that was NOT Yuri's claim at all.

Seppo,

The above is projection. You do this on a regular basis; I've pointed out an instance of your doing this in another post. Perhaps one day you will go beyond this sort of ad hominim and really participate in a discussion about the ARCHAEOLOGICAL issues. You know, like what this ng is for?

Tom McDonald

Thanks, Seppo, for correcting some of these misrepresentations by dweller.

Myself, I've given up >

Yes, his syntax had always been rather tortuous... :)

Yes, I suppose that for dweller it's always been a matter of overriding importance not to let the ancient peoples have any contacts across the oceans. We all know that it was the Great White God Columbus who invented the boat!

But, for myself, the matter of overriding importance is to demonstrate that the ancient Native Americans were far more sophisticated than our racist archaeological establishment would allow.

For dweller and his associates OTOH, if there's any suspicion that the ancient Native Americans may have shared some cultural achievement with any other peoples, then they never knew of any such cultural achievement!

So this is how the Native American cultural traditions are systematically dumbed down by dweller and Co.

BTW to correct a common misconception, archaeology shows quite clearly that some Native American cultural achievements had been introduced to the rest of the world thousands of years ago (such as for example American maize in ancient India). So it wasn't just a one way exchange.

All the best,

Yuri.

Yuri Kuchinsky in Toronto -=O=-

It amazes me that you haven't killfiled lots of people. I'm never remotely likely to agree with you - seeing as you are hopelessly confused. So why do you want to see my taking the mickey out of you? Others do the same.

Quite. As a person who embraces ignorance in scientific matters, why do you not do so in usenet?

My name is not dweller, but I used my initial D, and my surname Weller, to make a joke, dweller@ramtops -- which I wouldn't expect Yuri to get. I don't make fun of people's names. I wish others wouldn't, even though it is tempting.

Yuri lies about my opinions in this post. And unless he has changed his mind (and if he has, he hasn't said so), he still claims that a number of innovations which most archaeologists think were invented indigenously in the Americas were brought to the Americas from across the oceans. Yet somehow he tries to twist this to make him the defender of innovation in the Americas!

Let's see. Yuri says that a lot of this sophistication came from people coming to the Americas from abroad. But those who say that these innovations were truly indigenous in Yuri-speak are racists who deny Native Americans any sophistication? Yuri has clearly studied George Orwell.

For shared, read 'taught to the indigenous population by people from abroad'. In other words, not invented by the indigenous Americans.

Yuri thinks if he lies enough about other people someone might be stupid enough to believe him.

Doug

For the particular messages Douggie pointed to, and the claims he made about it were exactly as stated by myself. It was FACT.

I get annoyed by frauds, and point it out. You may not like your puppet master being shown up for what he is - tough!

Oh but your Puppet Master is allowed to engage in ad hominim and blatant LIES about other posters to further his political agendas, eh..... so why is that, eh Tom? HE needs not stick to "the ARCHAEOLOGICAL issues", .... and why is that Tom? Please explain!

Seppo,

You're funny. Don't ever change.

Tom McDonald

"So you can't back your statement up. OK."