American Indian's lack of gold

a reply to: Ahabstar

The Indians did not have much use for gold, as you said, who needs such a weak metal. They did use gold leaf to cover some statues and artifacts in South America long ago, it was more to make things look more impressive, not to use as tools.

Myself, I would rather have silver or copper as a metal for trade, I cannot understand why people are attracted to gold. Silver does kill microbes when plated on silverware, but brass has some good benefits too.

The ancient indigenous people of Alaska used gold in jewelry making. General consensus among scholars seems to be that the indigenous people of the lower 48 never developed the skills needed to work gold.

Perhaps the US was just a much younger civilization without contact with more advanced cultures.

While they had knowledge of, and access to the gold for hundreds of years, they did not think twice about it. They valued it no more than the settlers valued sea shells, until they discovered it was useful to trade with. The owner of Sutter’s Mill, where the gold was originally found, previously paid his workers with tin coins that could only be spent at his own store. That is how all fiat money ends up sometimes - spendable only in a few locations. Gold and Silver, however, are accepted worldwide. In any language, and nearly every culture, Gold talks, and people listen.

Linky

a reply to: rickymouse

Afaik, gold is gold because its limited supply and because it doesn't tarnish like other metals. It's also denser than silver meaning more value for the size of coin. Just ideas here, I'm no economist

a reply to: Iconic

Big thing is that it is more malleable and shines without tarnishing. The low melting point is also handy. However, gold is really only good for jewelry and smaller items. A gold hammer or knife would be rather useless.

Silver has many of the same qualities while remaining a stronger metal. Silver does tarnish, but that black patina looks good as well, especially inside etched portions.

Aluminum is an odd metal. It constantly rusts, just that it has an oxidized surface that retards the rust. Until rubbed with mercury…mercury will cause aluminum rims to dissolve into a powdery jagged rust in no time.

Gold and trinkets probably didn't make a good souffle. And anyway, Who were they going to trade it with, and for what? more gold?

Food and shelter were their priority.

originally posted by: rickymouseThere is some evidence of trade between Europe and the Mediterranean going back way before Columbus.

Perhaps if they were being victimized for the gold, perhaps by Central American tribes, maybe anyone with a real knowledge of gold or copper was executed. Then the remaining people didn't know to value the stuff.

Gold dust could be labor intensive to gather up because it might be sparsely distributed.

I read somewhere that the archaeological genetic record of the Americas reflects the fact that the population has almost completely turned over several times in most areas.

originally posted by: SoloprotocolAnd anyway, Who were they going to trade it with, and for what? more gold?

The Barbary Pirates who built the Bimini Road, of course.

Yea indigenous is to vague when I say Indian in real life every knows exactly the brown people I am talking about and no one thinks curry.

a reply to: TzarChasm

originally posted by: Soloprotocol
Gold and trinkets probably didn't make a good souffle. And anyway, Who were they going to trade it with, and for what? more gold?

Food and shelter were their priority.

Are we talking about the same Native Americans here? They crafted elaborate beadwork and ritual items of various descriptions. They definitely had enough time left over to do non essential things.

originally posted by: Solvedit

originally posted by: Soloprotocol
Gold and trinkets probably didn't make a good souffle. And anyway, Who were they going to trade it with, and for what? more gold?

Food and shelter were their priority.

Are we talking about the same Native Americans here? They crafted elaborate beadwork and ritual items of various descriptions. They definitely had enough time left over to do non essential things.

Well, they never had Sky sports. The ladies made home while the men hunted. Try coming back a week late to Pocahontas with a bag of shiny rocks instead of fur and meat.

originally posted by: Soloprotocol

originally posted by: Solvedit

originally posted by: Soloprotocol
Gold and trinkets probably didn't make a good souffle. And anyway, Who were they going to trade it with, and for what? more gold?

Food and shelter were their priority.

Are we talking about the same Native Americans here? They crafted elaborate beadwork and ritual items of various descriptions. They definitely had enough time left over to do non essential things.

Well, they never had Sky sports. The ladies made home while the men hunted. Try coming back a week late to Pocahontas with a bag of shiny rocks instead of fur and meat.

Look at all this ritual stuff they did have time to make.
Gold would have been easier to work with than some of these materials. www.bing.com...

Regarding the Bimini road, some think it's been debunked as a man made phenomenon because it's made of mineralized sand, despite the fact that it's composed of regular, rectangular blocks and is shaped like a Phoenecian dock.

Perhaps it was built like the Aztec causeways across Lake Texcoco. Perhaps one culture borrowed the collapsible pier technology from the other.

They built two closely spaced rows of wood pilings and put fill in between them, then put a wooden platform for traffic on top. The pilings and the upper platform could be removed, leaving nothing for an enemy to use to breach the moat formed by Lake Texcoco across Tenochtitlan.

There could have been hundreds of Bimini roads, each disassembled when necessary in order to keep the knowledge of the New World's riches from other explorers. Perhaps the one actually in the Bimini lagoon was not disassembled until the sand inside mineralized (it can take less than 50 years.) Perhaps there was a mutiny, epidemic, hurricane, or some other cause which prevented the pirates from disassembling their dock.

Maybe Michigan got named after Michoacan and not the other way around as the legend goes.

originally posted by: nugget1
The ancient indigenous people of Alaska used gold in jewelry making. General consensus among scholars seems to be that the indigenous people of the lower 48 never developed the skills needed to work gold.

Perhaps the US was just a much younger civilization without contact with more advanced cultures.

Any links to info on that? I've been living in Alaska for 23 years and I've never seen a single Native Alaskan artifact that had any gold or was made of gold. I've always found that odd.

a reply to: Soloprotocol

The vikings and a few other ship groups around the mediteranian area needed to have weight in their ships to get across the ocean to pick things up. You will find some interesting carved rocks and tablets here in America that were traded to the Indians to get gold and certain other metals, especially copper they needed to help make the brazen swords and shields for their soldiers. What did the Indians like? Carved stones...maybe not expensive statues, just the carved stones that people practiced on while training for sculptures. Native Americans learned to carve statues and stuff from somewhere, once they traded the worthless gold to get neat stuff carved of stone or jewelry made from cheaper metals for a while, they found how to make these things themselves. They wonder why so many lesser quality stone carvings are here in America....because they could buy them from people digging in the fields or homes in Italy and other places for cheap. They also traded tools to the Indians for metals. Native Americans did make stone tools long ago, and some are pretty nice, I found some here. But there are old gold mines here that were mined way before the white man came to this area and when they did come they greatly expanded the gold mines and drained the veins near the surface in the U.P

There are even old copper mines from over a thousand years ago on Isle Royal, long before the records show that Europeans were here.

a reply to: Solvedit

That is true, the Spanish were here long before Columbus too, and the Spanish people do have some unique immunity and they are carriers of diseases that effected the Native Americans. They had this problem recently with aide workers when they had that Hurricane destroy Haiti and other islands off of Florida.

The spanish have long lived symbiotically with microbes others in the world had no immunity to...they were spreading these diseases all over with their trading for over a thousand years.


The Mayans have records in their carvings of ships that are similar to very early viking or another European ships from over fifteen hundred years ago. They were not Mayan style ships....those trading countries of Europe and the Mediteranian knew the currents of the Ocean for many centuries before Columbus, and the earliest people of not native American origin in California from over a thousand of years ago had artifacts found in China and other Asian countries of that time period.

Some of the artifacts found on the US east coast and Canada are ancient...junk traded by Europeans probably with the Natives here. Diseases from the European and Asian continent killed off Native Americans in America many times...diseases that we now can treat with antibiotics making it safer for international travel. The Native Americans who did survive passed on immunity to their offspring, those without immunity died off.

It seems like I heard the answer to this several years ago. The Natives surely did see it. When Kit Carson was up northeast of here, he found it laying all over the place. I may have been a spiritual reason that they believed that they were not to touch it. In the Superstation mountains of Arizona, there is talk that the natives knew where rich deposits were, and they also knew that it would attract the white man into the area which they didn't want. They reportedly kept the locations of the deposits secret, and even buried them.

One thing is certain, is they absolutely knew it was here. They were not blind. There was plenty of it too. There is a place near the town of Volcano, in Sutter creek where I used to carry a tweezers and pick gold flakes off of the rocks in the stream. I also have coffee cans that I glued Plexiglas in as a bottom. I could look clearly into the streambed cracks and fan the sand aside, then pick out gold flakes and small gold nuggets.

originally posted by: visitedbythemIn the Superstation mountains of Arizona, there is talk that the natives knew where rich deposits were, and they also knew that it would attract the white man into the area which they didn't want.

Perhaps, before the white man, the natives were also concerned about more powerful tribes to the South.

Tribes which had had contact with the ancient Mediterranean and knew how to build a pyramid and organize an army.

originally posted by: Solvedit
Regarding the Bimini road, some think it's been debunked as a man made phenomenon because it's made of mineralized sand, despite the fact that it's composed of regular, rectangular blocks and is shaped like a Phoenecian dock.

Perhaps it was built like the Aztec causeways across Lake Texcoco. Perhaps one culture borrowed the collapsible pier technology from the other.

They built two closely spaced rows of wood pilings and put fill in between them, then put a wooden platform for traffic on top. The pilings and the upper platform could be removed, leaving nothing for an enemy to use to breach the moat formed by Lake Texcoco across Tenochtitlan.

There could have been hundreds of Bimini roads, each disassembled when necessary in order to keep the knowledge of the New World's riches from other explorers. Perhaps the one actually in the Bimini lagoon was not disassembled until the sand inside mineralized (it can take less than 50 years.) Perhaps there was a mutiny, epidemic, hurricane, or some other cause which prevented the pirates from disassembling their dock.

The evidence seems to show that, despite the possibly misleading nature of its appearance, Bimini Road is of natural origin:

The consensus among geologists and archaeologists is that the Bimini Road is a natural feature composed of beachrock that orthogonal and other joints have broken up into rectangular, subrectangular, polygonal, and irregular blocks. (en.wikipedia.org...)