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[fearn]

Hi All,

Couple of historical notes, somewhat off topic:

There was indigenous ironworking going on in the Arctic--the Greenland Arctic. Bits of the Cape York Meteorite (which landed on the Cape York Peninsula, NW Greenland roughly 10,000 years ago) were being cut off and cold forged into blades at least 1000 years ago (ref: McGhee, Ancient People of the Arctic, 2001). The meteorite is currently at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH link)

I'm still looking for images of these blades, but I suspect that they would have been small tools, rather than big daggers. Cold forging means pounding a flake into shape and scraping it sharp, and that would take a lot of effort to make any sort of useful blade.

I'd also point out that the "Old Copper Complex" in the western Great Lakes area dates back to 6,000 years ago, although copper working was confined to jewelry by 3,000 years ago. Apparently, when the copper mines in Michigan were found by Europeans, they were human-worked pits with the tools still in them.

Basically, copper working isn't new to North America. The big issue to make it work is heat and technology. Copper melts at 1085 deg. C, about 200 deg C hotter than a campfire. Because of this, you need some precursor technology, such as a pottery kiln, to provide expertise and technology in getting the proper temperatures. Iron can be similarly worked in a bloomery at 950 deg C up (1070 deg. C is apparently optimal). This is lower than the temperature required to melt iron (1538 deg C), but importantly, it requires bellows and charcoal to work.

So if we're looking for a culture that has independently developed iron or copper smelting, I think it's a safe guess that they'd also have things like ceramic pots, probably bellows (or at least blow tubes), and some other technological infrastructure lying around. While I have great admiration for the skills of the tribes of the Pacific Northwest and Pacific Arctic, they weren't potters. Rather, they were carvers and weavers. Prior to Contact, I think they worked native copper lumps whenever they could find them, but they didn't start working big sheets of copper until those were available through trade with the Europeans (the copper was used to coat the hull to make it worm-proof, and ships carried extra for repairs).

So far as figuring out how old the daggers are, I think this sets an upper limit. They probably could not have been produced prior to European contact. The tribes didn't have the precursor technology necessary to get enough copper (let alone iron) to make them. However, other groups (notably the Hawaiians) learned how to work with iron quite quickly after they met their first blacksmiths, and I'd bet that's the case for the PNW as well. They weren't stupid people, after all, just limited to the technology that their local environment could sustain.

My 0.00002 cents,

F

[Tim Simmons]

Good points Fearn. I think the idea of oxygenating a fire is not hard to grasp even if an area is not known for ceramic production. One just has to think of the low fired ceramic wares from Africa, often fired on an open fire or smouldering dung fire. Yet we see African smelting of iron from a hole in the ground, the fire oxygenated from simple bag bellows. I would imagine simple smelting sites like these would present problems for archaeologists to differentiate from domestic hreaths? The picture is from "Kwakiul Art, Audrey Hawthorn, University of Washington Press. Perhaps inspired by European design or not? but I cannot believe that people who make such splendid articulated masks would have problems arriving at a form of bellows.

[fearn]

Originally Posted by Tim Simmons

Good points Fearn. I think the idea of oxygenating a fire is not hard to grasp even if an area is not known for ceramic production. One just has to think of the low fired ceramic wares from Africa, often fired on an open fire or smouldering dung fire. Yet we see African smelting of iron from a hole in the ground, the fire oxygenated from simple bag bellows. I would imagine simple smelting sites like these would present problems for archaeologists to differentiate from domestic hreaths? The picture is from "Kwakiul Art, Audrey Hawthorn, University of Washington Press. Perhaps inspired by European design or not? but I cannot believe that people who make such splendid articulated masks would have problems arriving at a form of bellows.

Hi Tim,

I agree that once you point out the problem and solution, they would be fully capable of understanding. However, there are a bunch of lessons that you have to learn to work iron, including:

1. Rocks melt/ become flexible with heat. They knew that heat-treating chert and other stones made them more workable for knapping, but the idea that things become more flexible with heat is more applicable to wood than stone.
2. That it's useful to make super-hot fires. This is the pottery lesson.
3. That charcoal is useful for making super-hot fires.
4. That copper can be melted in super-hot fires.
5. That bellows, blow-tubes, or other gizmos help make fires hotter--I'm sure they knew about blowing on flames, but that sustained air flow thing is tricky.
6. That furnaces help make really hot fires.
7. (The trickier part) that if you heat up ocher or other iron ore in a charcoal furnace with a draft, you get this stuff that, if you pound it repeatedly under heat in the proper fashion, turns out to be really useful--iron.

That's a lot to learn from scratch. I think it was easier in Eurasia and Africa because there was so much trade in ideas going around that one tribe didn't have to make all of the discoveries in order to make iron. They could borrow or steal from others.

Now, assuming you don't know about iron or even melting and molding copper. How do you know that there's something called iron that's out there and worth having, let alone discover all those steps and put them together? However, once you've seen iron and steel, it's not hard to learn how to make it.

F

[VANDOO]

PURE GOLD, PURE SILVER AS WELL AS PURE COPPER NUGETS CAN BE FOUND IN RIVERS AND STREAMS OR DUG FROM ROCKS IN SEVERAL AREAS OF THE AMERICAS. CONSIDERING THE METAL WORK THAT WAS DONE IN PRECOLUMBIAN AMERICA NORTH AND SOUTH WHICH IS OBVIOUS IN THE MANY ARTEFACTS FOUND IN MUSEUMS MANY OF WHICH WERE DUG BY ARCHEOLOGISTS THERE CAN BE NO DOUBT THAT METAL WORK WAS DONE OVER A LONG PERIOD AND OVER A LARGE AREA.THE LARGER CIVILIZATIONS (SUCH AS THE MOUND BUILDERS, AZTECK, INCA, MAYA) NO DOUBT SENT OUT PARTYS TO EXPLORE AND TRADE OVER LARGE AREAS IN ANCIENT TIMES SO THEIR TECKNOLOGY WOULD HAVE SPREAD.
THERE ARE ARTEFACTS IN GOLD, SILVER,COPPER AND BRONZE SO PERHAPS THERE WAS RUDIMENTRY IRON WORKING BUT IRON UNLIKE THE ABOVE METALS IS SELDOM FOUND IN NUGGET OR LARGE LUMPS EXCEPT IN METEORITES. THAT WOULD HAVE MADE IT MORE DIFFICULT TO REFINE THAN THE OTHERS PLUS THE HIGHER HEAT REQUIRED SO PERHAPS IF ANY ARTEFACTS WERE MADE OF IT THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN SMALL PERHAPS AMULETS AND NO DOUBT WOULD HAVE RUSTED AWAY. I AM SURE IF ANY OF THE METAL WORKERS OF THE DAY CAME ACROSS IRON THEY WOULD HAVE EXPERIMENTED WITH IT AS THEY DID WITH OTHER METALS.
I WONDER IF ANY ARCHEOLOGICAL DIGGS HAVE FOUND RUST IN ANY OF THE BURIALS THAT HAVE BEEN EXCAVATED?

I AGREE THE IRON OR STEEL KNIVES THAT STARTED THIS THREAD ARE MORE LIKELY AFTER CONTACT WAS MADE, WHICH CAN COVER QUITE A LONG PERIOD AND DIFFERENT POSSIBILITYS AS TO WHO VISITED THE AMERICAS BEFORE COLUMBUS. CHINESE, AFRICANS,PHONECIANS,VIKINGS, EGYPTIANS AMONG OTHER POSSIBILITYS.

JUST MY 2 CENTS WORTH

[David]

If we can count on oral tradition at all (and granted, it can be questionable at times) the "Killer Whale" dagger i posted in post #14 goes back 10 generations. If we count a generation as 20 yrs. that would place it's origins in the very beginning of the 1800's. If we look at the very competent crafting of this blade though, it is clear that the Tlingit did not learn to forge like this over night, so i think we need to look just a bit further back than that date for the introduction of this art form to the tribes.
I agree with Barry that we don't necessarily need to link this to the first European encounters. Chinese or other Asian explorers may well have made the voyage (or trek) across the Bering Strait years before the English or even the Russians arrived, though if the 1741 date for Russian encounters is correct blades like this may well have been made before the end of the 18th century.

[VANDOO]

WE ALL HAVE TO GO WITH RECORDED HISTORY WHICH IS A FAIRLY RECENT THING AND MUCH OF THE FIRST RECORDED HISTORY WAS LOST DUE TO NATURAL DISASTERS,WAR, THEFT AND THE INTOLERANTANCE OF ONE CULTURE FOR ANOTHERS HISTORY OR BELIEFS. TODAY HISTORY IS CONSTANTLY BEING REWRITTEN, MANY TIMES TO EXPRESS THE VIEWS OF THE WRITER OR GROUP REGARDLESS OF ITS ACCURACY AND OFTEN JUST PROPAGANDA OR OUTRIGHT LIES.
THERE ARE JUST TOO MANY UNKNOWNS TO BE ABLE TO STATE ANYTHING IS ABSOLUTELY CORRECT IN PREHISTORY AND OFTEN IN RECORDED HISTORY. MUCH KNOWLEGE HAS BEEN LOST IN MODERN TIMES WITHOUT MAJOR DISASTERS SUCH AS THE COLLAPSE OF CIVILIZATION. FOR EXAMPLE CAN ANYONE MAKE A STRADIVARIUS VIOLIN TODAY, THE ANSWER IS NO BUT THEY ARE WORKING ON IT.
A BIT OFF TOPIC BUT HERE IN OKLAHOMA WE HAVE MANY MARKEINGS ON VARIOUS ROCKS SOME APPEAR TO BE ANCIENT NORSE,PHONECIAN, EGYPTIAN AS WELL AS OTHERS FAKE OR NOT??? BUT THE HUMAN RACE HAS ALWAYS BEEN PRONE TO WANDER OR GET THEMSELVES INTO TROUBLE SO THAT SOME PEOPLE CAME HERE BEFORE COLUNBUS IS LIKELY THRU DESIGN OR DISASTER?? THE POLYNESIAN RACES CERTAINLY PLAYED A PART IN SETTELING THIS CONTENENT. THE COASTS OF THE AMERICAS ARE MUCH MORE EASILY ACCESIBLE THAN THE INTERIOR IN OKLAHOMA SO IF ANCIENT VISITORS POSSIBLY MADE IT HERE THEY WERE MOST CERTIANLY ON THE COASTS.

[fearn]

Originally Posted by David

If we can count on oral tradition at all (and granted, it can be questionable at times) the "Killer Whale" dagger i posted in post #14 goes back 10 generations. If we count a generation as 20 yrs. that would place it's origins in the very beginning of the 1800's. If we look at the very competent crafting of this blade though, it is clear that the Tlingit did not learn to forge like this over night, so i think we need to look just a bit further back than that date for the introduction of this art form to the tribes.
I agree with Barry that we don't necessarily need to link this to the first European encounters. Chinese or other Asian explorers may well have made the voyage (or trek) across the Bering Strait years before the English or even the Russians arrived, though if the 1741 date for Russian encounters is correct blades like this may well have been made before the end of the 18th century.

Hi David,

While I agree that one does not learn to forge good blades over night, I do think that every good smith learns to forge good blades within his working lifetime, or a decade or two. Given that window, I'm not surprised that the Tlingit were making good blades early on.

As another example, think of the plains Indians. They went from a culture that had never seen a horse to being some of the best horsemen in the world in a generation or two. Change can happen quite rapidly, even in traditional cultures.

F

[David]

Originally Posted by fearn

While I agree that one does not learn to forge good blades over night, I do think that every good smith learns to forge good blades within his working lifetime, or a decade or two. Given that window, I'm not surprised that the Tlingit were making good blades early on.
As another example, think of the plains Indians. They went from a culture that had never seen a horse to being some of the best horsemen in the world in a generation or two. Change can happen quite rapidly, even in traditional cultures.

ummm, yes Fearn, i think we agree. That's why i wrote:

Originally Posted by David

we need to look just a bit further back than that date for the introduction of this art form to the tribes.

[Tim Simmons]

It is clear reaching the required heat could not of been a problem. To extract "float copper" if it was only this copper, and then melt it into a workable amount, indeed to work the copper as many of the copper artifacts are large.

Smelting was undoubtably known of in parts of South America, the Andes for instance. Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin. Tin is only found as an ore. You can have a copper/lead bronze, lead can be found naturally but is extemely rare so that to would be from an ore. You could have copper/silver but that is billon and different to bronze.

The B, Columbia site has record of an iron knife from 1780?

Could possible smelting and working iron be found in corners like the Andean bronze. The materials are there. Look at these beautiful metal art objects from "Ancient Arts of the Andes" the Museum of Modern Art.

[ThePepperSkull]

I never knew there was such magnificent ethnographic blade work done in my neck of the woods! this is fantastic!

[Rick]

Someone's been delving into the archives ...

[ThePepperSkull]

moreso than lately, I suppose. This forum is a wealth of knowledge that i can't get enough of!

I was never aware of Pacific Northwest aboriginal metalwork and I've grown up here almost all my life, so this is a revelation to me! Very interesting. I always seem to stumble upon something new here.

[David]

Originally Posted by fearn

So if we're looking for a culture that has independently developed iron or copper smelting, I think it's a safe guess that they'd also have things like ceramic pots, probably bellows (or at least blow tubes), and some other technological infrastructure lying around. While I have great admiration for the skills of the tribes of the Pacific Northwest and Pacific Arctic, they weren't potters. Rather, they were carvers and weavers.

I would think that this would have less to do with available technology and more that it might be a real bitch to dig clay out of the perma-frost. They were carvers and weavers based on available resources.