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Sican tumi, or ceremonial knife, Peru, 850–1500 CE. Metallurgy in pre-Columbian America is the extraction, purification and alloying of metals and metal crafting by Indigenous peoples of the Americas prior to European contact in the late 15th century. Indigenous Americans had been using native metals from ancient times, with recent finds of ...
West Mexican smiths worked primarily in copper during the initial period, with some low-arsenic alloys, as well as occasional employment of silver and gold. Lost-wax cast bells were introduced from lower Central America and Colombia during this phase, along with several classes of cold-worked ornaments and hand tools, such as needles and tweezers.
Arsenic may be an essential trace mineral in birds, involved in the synthesis of methionine metabolites, with feeding recommendations being between 0.012 and 0.050 mg/kg. [120] Some evidence indicates that arsenic is an essential trace mineral in mammals. However, the biological function is not known. [14] [15]
Metal production in the ancient Middle East. The metals of antiquity are the seven metals which humans had identified and found use for in prehistoric times in Africa, Europe and throughout Asia: [1] gold, silver, copper, tin, lead, iron, and mercury. Zinc, arsenic, and antimony were also known during antiquity, but they were not recognised as ...
Arsenical bronze. Arsenical bronze is an alloy in which arsenic, as opposed to or in addition to tin or other constituent metals, is combined with copper to make bronze. The use of arsenic with copper, either as the secondary constituent or with another component such as tin, results in a stronger final product and better casting behavior.
Obsidian projectile point. Obsidian is a naturally formed volcanic glass that was an important part of the material culture of Pre-Columbian Mesoamerica. Obsidian was a highly integrated part of daily and ritual life, and its widespread and varied use may be a significant contributor to Mesoamerica's lack of metallurgy.
Native metals were prehistoric man's only access to metal, since the process of extracting metals from their ores is thought to have been discovered around 6500 BC. However, native metals could be found only in impractically small amounts, so while copper and iron were known well before the Copper Age and Iron Age , they did not have a large ...
The chemical elements were discovered in identified minerals and with the help of the identified elements the mineral crystal structure could be described. One milestone was the discovery of the geometrical law of crystallization by René Just Haüy , a further development of the work by Nicolas Steno and Jean-Baptiste L. Romé de l'Isle (the ...