The Copper Cache in Early and Middle Woodland North America

Open Access
- Author:
- McKnight, Matthew D.
- Graduate Program:
- Anthropology
- Degree:
- Doctor of Philosophy
- Document Type:
- Dissertation
- Date of Defense:
- October 01, 2007
- Committee Members:
- Dean R. Snow, Committee Chair/Co-Chair
George Robert Milner, Committee Member
Kenneth Gale Hirth, Committee Member
Barry Earl Scheetz, Committee Member - Keywords:
- laser ablation
Middle Woodland
Early Woodland
Hopewell
Adena
copper
ICP-MS - Abstract:
- Investigations of copper exchange generally focus on individual artifacts as the primary unit of study. This project instead looks at entire copper caches and the advantages of using the cache as the basic analytical unit. Converging on the cache brings into focus not just where copper was obtained, but more importantly, how it may have been obtained and moved about the landscape. Understanding the behavior behind the movement of these items is far more significant for our understanding of prehistory, than simply determining where copper came from. Still, determining the ultimate source of copper objects has undeniable implications for our models of prehistoric copper acquisition and consumption. There is disagreement over whether copper was acquired exclusively from the large Lake Superior native copper deposits or from many smaller local sources throughout the eastern Woodlands. The debate surrounding this issue has created a situation in which the question of where has greatly overshadowed the question of how. This study seeks to remedy the situation by examining both questions with an emphasis on cultures of the Early and Middle Woodland (ca. 1000 BC – AD 500). The primary objective of this dissertation is to test some of the models invoked for the acquisition and consumption of copper as they operated during this time period. Determination of source is an important secondary objective. These objective are achieved by (1) cataloguing the location and quantities of various artifact forms and incorporating these data into a GIS, (2) performing LA-ICP-MS trace-element work on a sample of 319 geologic specimens and 83 artifacts (representing 16 burial caches), and (3) using the results to reject models of copper acquisition and/or consumption that are incompatible with the data.