Swammerdami
Squadron Leader
(Is "Archaeomineralogy" a real word? Most of the Google hits point to a specific so-titled textbook.)
Just today I read that "Earliest fire-making dating back 400,000 years unearthed in Suffolk, England." The fire was made by rubbing pyrite and flint together. That pyrite isn't native to that region is among reasons researchers know the fire was man-made. It had long been assumed that fire-making was that old, but the 400,000 year-old date beats the old record for a specific confirmed fire by a factor of ten.
For most of my life topics like this didn't interest me. Finally I was intrigued by the controversy over the Indo-European Homeland and by Barry Cunliffe's Europe Between the Oceans. (I gave my copy of that beautiful book away and was thinking of buying another, but now discover it's available on archive.org.)
I show an image from that book below. Through early trading networks, jadeite axes manufactured in northern Italy found their way to northern Scotland (and from there to northern Ireland) by about 3800 BC, roughly coincident with the first farming in Scotland. Jadeite axes are described both as a "prestige good" and as particularly durable. ("Don't use Dad's special axe, kid. Go get one of those cheap flint axes."?)
I was reminded of these ancient jadeite axes a week or two ago when I read about recent discoveries in Mesoamerica. But Googling for such a story now I run into paywalls. The best I can do is post an image of a jade sculpture made about 2000 years ago somewhere in Mesoamerica.
Just today I read that "Earliest fire-making dating back 400,000 years unearthed in Suffolk, England." The fire was made by rubbing pyrite and flint together. That pyrite isn't native to that region is among reasons researchers know the fire was man-made. It had long been assumed that fire-making was that old, but the 400,000 year-old date beats the old record for a specific confirmed fire by a factor of ten.
For most of my life topics like this didn't interest me. Finally I was intrigued by the controversy over the Indo-European Homeland and by Barry Cunliffe's Europe Between the Oceans. (I gave my copy of that beautiful book away and was thinking of buying another, but now discover it's available on archive.org.)
I show an image from that book below. Through early trading networks, jadeite axes manufactured in northern Italy found their way to northern Scotland (and from there to northern Ireland) by about 3800 BC, roughly coincident with the first farming in Scotland. Jadeite axes are described both as a "prestige good" and as particularly durable. ("Don't use Dad's special axe, kid. Go get one of those cheap flint axes."?)
I was reminded of these ancient jadeite axes a week or two ago when I read about recent discoveries in Mesoamerica. But Googling for such a story now I run into paywalls. The best I can do is post an image of a jade sculpture made about 2000 years ago somewhere in Mesoamerica.
