American Indian's lack of gold

This is something I've been thinking about lately , Why is there such a lack of gold work from the American Indians it was abundant but most of their work is silver .

Considering that in South America it's everywhere , Why did the American Indians choose not to work with gold it had to be a choice and for that matter they never built pyramids or monuments like others mostly only using materials that "Go back they way they came"

They are just as old as the other society's but no gold work to be found .

Just curious if anyone else has wondered about this ?

a reply to: Ravenwatcher
I'd never considered it, but if they melted silver, and gold was known to be in their rocks, it would seem a mystery they waited for the European invaders?

You got me interested enough to wanna know that story, so as I'm typically too lazy to search lol, I hope you get some interesting replies here!👍

originally posted by: Ravenwatcher
This is something I've been thinking about lately , Why is there such a lack of gold work from the American Indians it was abundant but most of their work is silver .

Considering that in South America it's everywhere , What did the American Indians choose not to work with gold it had to be a choice and for that matter they never built pyramids or monuments like others mostly only using materials that "Go back they way they came"

The are just as old as the other society but no gold work to be found .

Just curious if anyone else has wondered about this ?

Probably because the tribes that settled and began making jewelry were located in an area with significant silver deposits. There may have been some small scale gold jewelry production in the other tribes but I'm not aware of it. Perhaps someone else can pitch in?

The World’s Largest Pyramid Is Hidden Under A Mountain In North America.
[dustyoldthing.com...]

You might also want to research Mound Builders in the US.

a reply to: nugget1

That's still a bit South considering it's only a few hours away from lets say AZ where gold is abundant , My 1st thought would be something happened South made them flee to the north uninhabited for some reason or another but none of the time lines match up I mean look the Hopi one of the oldest tribes chose to live on infertile ground and without a water source but no Hopi gold work .

To me it seems off that there would be for lack of better explanation some type of blockade or Zone that was not crossed between Mexico city and beyond .

a reply to: Ravenwatcher
Well they did build pyramids. Cahokia is the largest pyramid in North America: pyramidomania.com...

The gold question is really quite interesting. Being a placer miner myself, that’s a widely available resource in some areas, definitely pure enough to be hammered.

Intriguing

a reply to: Ravenwatcher

The gold part of that is an odd thing for sure. Very interesting observation.

However, on the other, we had the Mound Builders and the Mississippian culture. For things like large structures and metallurgy to develop, you needed a culture settled around agriculture, rather than the nomadic existence of those that moved with the herds and the seasons.

No idea why gold was not present, but it looks like copper was in use. Interesting topic

North America - with vast plains geographically lent itself for nomad and tribal culture. Tribal cultures in general never learn to work metal because to work metal you need a static place that can exist without being invaded on a constant basis to be productive.

It might also be asked why none of the American cultures ever put the wheel to any good use? They had them, they knew what they did, but they never put 2 and 2 together on how to use them to their advantage. Perhaps that since slavery was such a norm and human life was so unimportant, that those in power never saw a use for a wheel. Making things easier for people you could force to do whatever you wanted probably never entered their minds.

Who knows really, as long as European invented institutions continue to make it so certain questions about native Americans are off limits, we will probably never know.

plenty of gold

in california.

no indians?

i really have no idea why it would not be used.

hard to believe they were not aware of it's use farther south .

it's a head scratcher all rite.

When it comes right down to it, pound per pound gold is the weakest of metals with the heaviest weight. Of the Eastern tribes, beadwork seemed to be the art medium of choice. And beads were mostly painted cut up porcupine quills. Light, easy to work with and plentiful.

Cherokee was the only North American tribe that used blowguns with usually black locust thorns as the needles of the dart.

Most villages were rather transient among the Eastern tribes. Western tribes even more so, but there are exceptions to both. What is even more mysterious about all North American tribes is that all groups were somewhat short lived. They show up, are in place in an area for a while then disappear.

Most tribes did not have a written language pre-European contact. So history is all oral tradition. Conflict was rampant with losers being either absorbed or exterminated.

a reply to: Ravenwatcher

Probably due to the fact they traveled and moved camps more tha most. Probably took some for trading I would think.

Possibly knew how much the Aztecs liked it and just traded it all for food and more natural goods.

Just a guess though.

Personal ornamentation in all the native cultures of North America shows no connection with the pre-Columbian cultures of Central and South America. One of the most striking differences between the two is that in North America copper was much more frequently used than gold. In some parts of North America this metal may have been used before its use became known in the Western world, and at that distant time it was valued like gold.

Linky dinky

Too be fair there is a lot of stuff lacking stonework and masonry permanent dwellings, agricultural and the wheel. Then missing gold is really no surprise no real need for it.

a reply to: Ravenwatcher

Ahem.

Indigenous Americans is the term for tribal communities also referred to as first nations. There's nothing Indian about them. Say it with me. Indigenous... Americans. Indians are people who live in a geopolitical region called India, which is on the other side of the world.

Thank you for coming to my TED talk.

I think the Native Americans south of the Rio Grande had a fair amount of gold jewelry but it was all sent to Spain to be melted down.

I understand the North American natives never had the technology to mine or process gold, and very little copper.

they were a stone-age technology, after all.

the legend of El Dorado was based on gold, so presumably some of them had a fair amount.

There is clearly gold in North America but prospectors need specialized modern equipment to extract it with the exception of the gold which was found in California in 1847-8.

Perhaps someone in the Pre-Columbian Old World found something to export to North America. Perhaps the natives at the time did not know what gold was worth in the rest of the world and gave the traders a favorable exchange rate. Perhaps opium or captives.

Come to think of it, native Americans have features which don't entirely look like they could have come from Mongolia via the land bridge, but the features are often quite uniform over large groups, rather than being a few descendants of contact with some Post-Columbian person from the Old World.

Perhaps some tribes enslaved others in order to make them spend all their time gathering flecks of gold out of river beds. Perhaps it was the Central American tribes like the Maya and later the Aztec because they've left the most architecture.

Perhaps they traded with Old World pirates, perhaps the Vikings or the Barbary Pirates. Suppose the Barbary Pirates obtained opium or captives from the Ottoman Empire. Why the Ottoman Empire? It seems as if their conquest of Europe reached its peak right around the time Spain was confiscating Central America's gold.

a reply to: ElGoobero

Ironically had they known more of metallurgy and smithing, the Europeans would have had a terrible time. Many soils are so iron rich that reddish water is found in many creeks from iron content in the silt. Pottery and minor ceramics existed throughout the North American tribes more in the west than east but not unheard of in the east. Again transient lifestyle demanded lighter more durable but easily replaceable possessions.

The rusty silt dried and placed in a in a clay furnace pot surrounded by charcoal and a fan blower powered by a bow drill bow. There will be nuggets of pig iron pellets which can eventually be collected and smelted in a ceramic crucible. You now have Iron Age material for knives, axes, etc. There would be a whole lot of slag, but fools gold (iron pyrite) is and option. As is a nugget of fools gold can be used as the steel in flint and steel sparking especially after pounding with a good hammer rock on an anvil stone for better shaping (cold forging). You can cold forge coins into thumb knives or arrowheads in a survival situation.

Maybe they just didn't care much for it. Like how weak it is and maybe they simply didn't find it worthwhile to blend it with sturdier metals.

Just because the majority of the rest of the world went crazy over silly metal aesthetics doesn't mean that over on a largely untouched landmass that those people separated from the rest of the world would care about things that only have value because people buy into it.

The native Americans did do some gold mining, they used it to trade with those infatuated with gold from overseas many hundred years ago. There is some evidence of trade between Europe and the Mediterranean going back way before Columbus. Copper was also a trade item the Indians used to get stuff from Europe.